


Lies, Silence, and Songs

by The_Queen_In_The_North



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Animal Death, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Dark, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Non-Consensual Touching, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:21:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 9
Words: 22,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25585090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Queen_In_The_North/pseuds/The_Queen_In_The_North
Summary: Sansa Stark, a highborn lady of five-and-ten, is soon to be wedded to the king. But, before then, Sansa hopes to reveal her growing affections to another: her betrothed's sworn shield, Sandor "The Hound" Clegane. Before she can do this, Lord Petyr Baelish steps in and complicates the situation, leaving Sansa not only conflicted with her feelings, but silent and powerless. The Hound, on the other hand, is determined to learn what she is hiding.*AU - Canon Divergence*Creepy Littlefinger / Sadistic Joffrey
Relationships: Sandor Clegane/Original Female Character(s), Sandor Clegane/Sansa Stark
Comments: 55
Kudos: 168





	1. Chapter 1

Sansa Stark ate supper in her betrothed’s solar as she did every evening since his mother required it, her plate scarcely touched, her mind elsewhere, forcing her eyes not to glance over at the man guarding the door. 

Her betrothed, Joffrey Baratheon, the King of the Seven Kingdoms scowled at her from across the chestnut table inlaid with gold, piercing the roast lamb with a knife. “What are you over there smiling about?” 

The provocative daydreams involving Joffrey’s sworn shield were rudely interrupted. Sansa stared at the cruel green eyes and said, “Pray excuse me, Your Grace. I was just thinking about the wedding.”

“Oh,” he scoffed. “Yes, I suppose you’re eager to become a queen.” 

“Not to become queen, Your Grace. I can’t wait to marry you so I can bear your children,” she lied. Sansa couldn’t resist taking a glimpse at the door, watching the man beside it shake his head subtly.

The golden-haired king chortled with contempt. “If that’s what you’re eager for, I can take you up to my chambers and fill you with my seed after supper.”

Sansa smiled abashedly but inside she was screaming. “I’m sorry, Your Grace, I’m having my blood,” she fibbed.

Joffrey grimaced. “Ew.”

“May I retire for the night, Your Grace?” 

The king looked at her once more in disgust before pushing away his plate. “Please do,” he sneered. “Dog, take my betrothed back to her chambers and see to it that Ser Boros stands guard for me tonight; you’ve been a good enough pet-- take the night off.”

The mention of Ser Boros Blount sent a chill down Sansa’s spine. Out of all of Joffrey’s Kingsguard, he was the worst and easily the most wicked. _All jowls, always scowling, and always longing to hit me._

“Yes, Your Grace,” the Hound said. His eyes met hers for the first time that evening, their shared glance utterly titillating. 

“Pleasant dreams, Your Grace,” Sansa said as she stood from her chair with a smile, a smile prompted by knowing she would have time alone with Sandor Clegane again. Without returning the courtesy, Joffrey waved her away. In an effort to not appear eager, Sansa sauntered slowly across the solar and towards the Hound who held the door open for her.

“You chirp your lies better every day, little bird,” he muttered quietly beside her once they departed towards the stairwell.

Sansa smiled fondly. “Am I no longer the worst?”

“You’re good enough to fool most,” he admitted, “but not me.” 

When Sansa looked up at him, she witnessed the suggestive smirk on his face and wondered how she could have ever been scared of him. _I’ll kiss him tonight,_ she thought. _Soon I’ll be forced to marry Joffrey and the days of the Hound walking me to my bedchamber will be over._

The anticipation grew larger with every passing step, and by the time the two were outside her bedchamber, Sansa thought she might become sick. Most nights she would enter her chamber as soon as they arrived, giving a soft ‘thank you’ and smile before closing the door, however that evening she stood in front of the massively built man and showed no intention of going inside. The Hound looked at her and furrowed his brow. The corridor had never felt so warm.

“What is it, girl?”

Sansa took a deep breath and made to kiss him, but just as she placed her ivory hand onto his chest, her fingers caressing against his soot-dark armor while a thousand unspoken words passed between the two once their eyes met, an unwelcome voice called out. 

“Lady Sansa.”

Her hand fell in an instant from the Hound to return to her side. Sansa had never seen Sandor Clegane so startled from the brief gesture of affection. Turning around to face the opposite end of the corridor, she feigned a greeting smile. “Good evening, Lord Baelish.” _He didn’t see me touch the Hound,_ she prayed.

“ _Petyr_ ,” he corrected her, approaching with a grin as false as her own. “I do hope I am not intruding.”

“Not at all, I was just thanking him for escorting me back to my chambers.”

The lord gave her a curious look. “Perhaps you will allow me to escort you on the morrow; I, too, could use a gentle touch from time to time.”

Despite herself, Sansa winced. _He did see me._ “To what do I owe the pleasure, my lord?” 

Littlefinger glanced towards the Hound and said, “Run along, now.”

The Hound responded to the order with a grunt rather than with a word. Sansa longed to look over her shoulder as he departed, but Littlefinger stared at her intently as if gauging her reaction to his absence. Taking a single step towards her door, Lord Baelish placed one slender hand on the handle and opened it without any permission being granted. “After you, Sansa.”

“Thank you, my lord,” she said begrudgingly. 

“ _Petyr_ ,” he corrected her again.

Once the two were inside her dusky bedchamber, Sansa strode over to sit at her vanity, brushing her hair out as if Littlefinger were not even present.

“A dog he may be, my dear, but that does not mean you must needs pet him,” the lord said before sitting at the foot of her bed. Sansa watched as he smiled at her in the reflection of her looking glass, her brush snagging on a knot in her hair in the same instant, causing her to flinch.

“What is it that you wanted to speak with me about, my lord?” she asked, hoping to change the subject away from the Hound.

“ _Petyr,_ ” he sighed. “Would you like to take a stroll through the city tonight, Sansa?” Littlefinger asked far too kindly. 

Sansa’s hand stilled on the brush and looked over her shoulder quite swiftly. “The _city_? Joffrey will not allow me to leave the Red Keep.”

“I am not without friends, Sansa. You will find that we will be able to exit the Red Keep tonight without difficulty. I surmise you own a hooded cloak?”

Her hand set the brush down on her vanity slowly, intrigued with the idea of leaving the castle, even if it was with Petyr Baelish. “Yes-- where will we go?” 

“Wherever your heart desires. However, I do need to stop by one of my establishments to take care of a personal matter on the way.”

 _He’s going to take me into a brothel?_ While the grueling months spent in King’s Landing had done well to toughen her, the thought of stepping foot into a brothel made her uneasy. “Perhaps another night, my l-- Petyr.” Sansa turned back around and picked up her brush, easing it through her thick, auburn waves. 

Littlefinger rose from the bed and walked towards her, stopping once he was close enough to rest his hands on her shoulders. “I’m afraid it must be tonight, my dear. I depart King’s Landing on the morrow for diplomatic purposes on behalf of the king. It is unlikely that I will return until your wedding. And once you are wed, the opportunity to take you into the city will become quite impossible with your husband sharing your bed. So, Sansa, shall we take a stroll?”

The hands that fell over her shoulders burned, but despite heeding her better instincts, she ran the bristles through the last section of her hair, placed the brush softly atop her vanity, and met Littlefinger’s yearning gaze in the looking glass. “All right, Petyr.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


“He fucks them all this way, my dear. Just like a dog, he bends them right over and has his way with them.”

Sansa was pressed up against the stone wall inside a hidden alcove at one of Littlefinger’s establishments. The brothel apparently had many of these hidden rooms, not much bigger than a wardrobe, allowing the owner to peer in on each coupling inside through small, inconspicuous holes in the wall.

Lord Baelish held one hand over her mouth while the other pinned into the small of her back, forcing her to watch the Hound take a red-headed whore from behind. The two were fully nude; the whore’s back was arched, ass poking in the air atop a lavish canopy bed while Sandor Clegane stood behind her, thrusting away vigorously. Sansa shut her eyes tightly and felt the tears well up. Although she could no longer see the act, she could hear it, every grunt, breath, and whimper, and felt her heart sinking.

“I know it hurts, my dear,” Littlefinger whispered into her ear, his breath smelling of mint. “While you lay in your bedchamber and fantasize of his embrace, he comes here to fuck women who aren’t you. I know the pain far too well, sweetling. I experienced it every day once your mother wedded Eddard Stark. I, too, laid abed dreaming of her, knowing she was fucking your father instead.”

Sansa suppressed the urge to cry. It was humiliating enough to watch and listen to the Hound, a man she had developed a legitimate affection for, be intimate with a woman; being caught doing it by making too much noise would have been inexplicably mortifying.

“Why are you doing this?” Sansa spoke in a hushed voice against his hand, swallowing her sobs. 

“Five-and-ten is a confusing age, Sansa. You are maturing in many ways, one of them sexually, and it has been noted. If you want to be his whore, know _this_ is what it will get you, my dear. The only difference is that he won’t pay you afterwards.”

“I don’t--”

“Sansa, you mustn’t lie to me. As I’ve said before, I am not friendless. I am also not without whispers. Moaning has been heard coming from your bedchamber late in the night, and I suspect it is _him_ you are thinking of as you pleasure yourself. Well, my dear, take one last gander at the man you’ve been dreaming about all those nights.”

Her attempts at holding back the sobs failed. Littlefinger forcibly took her wrist and pulled her from the alcove and into the corridor of the upper level of the brothel. A blonde whore and a man old enough to be her grandfather walked into the room beside them, glancing over at Sansa when they heard her sobbing. Littlefinger waved them past and pulled the hood of her sable cloak further down to cover her auburn hair.

“During my travels, should I receive a single whisper of you and a certain dog engaging in any other activity outside of walking in pure silence inside the Red Keep, I will have my friends put his head on a spike. Now, come along, sweetling. It is far past your bedtime.”

  
  


* * *

“You were quiet this evening.”

After another unwanted supper with her betrothed, Sansa walked several inches further away from the Hound than usual on their way towards her bedchamber, the distance painful yet necessary. Sansa rarely had a large appetite, but that evening she did not touch her plate once. Joffrey had complained she was getting too skinny and would lose her teats, but all Sansa could think about was the sights and sounds she heard in Littlefinger’s brothel, remembering the threat that was placed on Sandor Clegane’s life.

Her eyes had been fixated on the table in front of her, even on Joffrey despite his scowling, but Sansa could not bear to look at the Hound. The couple of times her eyes _did_ peer over at him, she could only see how he had looked the night prior, naked, sweat dripping down his muscles, finding pleasure in the whore who bent over for him, and a wave of conflicting feelings consumed her. The memory of the Hound’s masculine, muscled body was undeniably arousing, but the act itself sent her into a misery she had not felt since she had first been beaten by Joffrey’s Kingsguard. 

When Sansa did not respond to his remark as they descended the stairwell, she heard him clear his throat.

“Did something happen after court today?” 

_‘Pure silence’, Littlefinger said._ Sansa shook her head without lifting her gaze from her feet.

And pure silence it was; the only sounds produced by the two were their feet stepping onto the stone floors inside the Red Keep, the sound his armor made as he shifted, and their breaths that seemed to come in unison. 

It felt like a fortnight had passed before they approached her bedchamber. At the sight of her door, Sansa felt a wave of relief knowing she would no longer have to force herself not to speak to him. _Until tomorrow,_ she thought dejectedly, _and then the pain festers once again._

Before she could enter her bedchamber, the mass of Sandor Clegane stood just in front of the door, forbidding her to pass. 

“What did that cunt Littlefinger say to you?” he asked suspiciously after the sustained silence.

Her head shot up from the floor after hearing the question. Once he saw Sansa’s reaction, he crossed his arms over his chest and the scarred side of his mouth twitched.

“Go on, little bird. Tell me.”

Just when she began to consider whispering as quietly as she could, a chambermaid Sansa did not recognize exited a nearby room and gave the two a quick glance. Sansa ducked under the Hound’s elbow and forced the door open, slamming it shut in his face. 

That night she laid in bed and fantasized about Sandor Clegane, knowing he would be with another woman.


	2. Chapter 2

“A foot or your tongue-- choose peasant.”

The following day in court was warm and the air was thick. Sansa stood inside the Great Hall beside Ser Boros Blount just beneath the Iron Throne. It was not the proper place for a highborn lady to stand at court, but when Joffrey brought in commoners who were said to have committed a crime, he wanted Sansa to stand close enough to witness the blood and destruction that would occur at the hands of Ser Ilyn Payne, the King’s Justice, the same man who murdered her father.

“Your Grace, forgive me,” the thin man begged. 

“You called me a bastard and ran off when my gold cloaks attempted to seize you,” Joffrey said, petting the crossbow in his lap as if it were a kitten. “Now choose: foot or tongue.”

“Your Grace, I can’t--”

“You can’t choose?” Joffrey scoffed. “Very well. I’ll let my betrothed decide. Lady Sansa,” the king summoned her. 

Sansa’s head slowly looked over her shoulder towards the Iron Throne, but before her eyes met Joffrey, they met the Hound who stood to the king’s right, discovering that he was watching her. His grunting, the whore’s whimpering, and the sound of his skin smacking against hers became audible once again.

“Choose, my lady,” Joffrey prompted impatiently, returning her to the present.

Shifting her attention towards the Kingslander in front of her, Sansa watched as he pleaded with his eyes. _It will still be possible for him to walk with a crutch,_ she reasoned. _But it will never be possible for him to speak without a tongue._ “A foot, Your Grace.”

Joffrey gave a menacing smirk. “You heard the lady, Ser Ilyn. Remove his tongue!”

“No! I didn’t say--” her cry broke off when Ser Boros’ fat fist slammed into her lungs, forcing her to fall onto her knees and clutch her belly. Sansa could hear Joffrey snickering behind her.

“ _And_ his foot, Ser Ilyn,” the king added. “Both of them.”

“Your Grace, I beg--” she heard the common man plead before the sound of steel slicing slick flesh filled the hall. Sansa’s head dropped towards the floor, terrified at the mutilation taking place in front of her. The fleshy knight’s hand grabbed her hair with a fist and forced her head up to watch the Kingslander being held down by Ser Mandon Moore while Ser Ilyn took the longsword that had once been her father’s and sliced the tongueless man’s feet off like a knife cutting through mutton. The common man’s throaty cries as he choked on his blood were deafening, but Joffrey’s laughter was still somehow louder. Sansa thought he even sounded aroused.

She shut her eyes just as she had done in the brothel and refused to cry, her breaths jagged after Ser Boros’ fist knocked the air from her lungs. Sansa’s short breaths accompanied by the thick, warm air filling the hall caused her to be on the verge of fainting, but she was not granted that mercy.

“Ser Boros, assist Ser Mandon in carrying out the dying fool. Toss him outside the gates so the other peasants can see how their king responds to slander; the rest of you, out!” Joffrey ordered the audience, their faces pale from the maiming inside the hall. 

Relief did not come when Ser Boros Blount’s hand forcefully released her hair, for when she opened her eyes, the two bloody feet and tongue were staring at her from no more than three paces away. As she dropped her head back towards the floor, a large hand grabbed underneath her arm to lift her up gently. Sansa jolted at the touch once she realized it was the Hound and immediately scanned the hall with her eyes, searching for anyone who might be Littlefinger’s friend, his eyes and ears, his whispers. However, Sansa saw no one. All those who remained inside the Great Hall were her, Sandor Clegane, King Joffrey, Ser Ilyn Payne, and the two sliced feet and tongue lying in a puddle of blood. 

“A fitting punishment for calling me a bastard. Wouldn’t you agree, my lady?” Joffrey asked smugly.

Sansa looked down at the muscled hand that maintained its grip underneath her arm and recollected how it had looked when gripping onto the whore’s hip. “Yes, Your Grace.”

“Where do you often go after court?” Joffrey asked her, his eyes fixated on the bloody mess in front of the throne. 

She tried pulling away from the Hound’s grasp, but he refused to let go. “The godswood, Your Grace.”

Joffrey gave her one last loathsome glance before brushing the quarrel that was loaded in the crossbow with his fingertips. “Dog, you heard her-- take her to her bedchamber.”

“But I didn’t--”

“Hush, girl,” Sandor Clegane muttered quietly. 

Sansa’s feet hit the stone inside the corridor with haste, attempting to walk in front of the Hound rather than beside him. His strides were longer, however, and no matter how quickly she paced forward, she could still see him in her peripheral vision. 

Upon approaching her bedchamber without a single word uttered between them, the Hound arrived at the door first, but rather than block her way like he had done the evening prior, he reached for the handle and opened it for her to enter. Sansa scurried right past him and into the room, listening as the door slammed forcefully behind her and sighed once yet another painful moment of silence had ended. It was not until she sat on the edge of her bed did she realize the Hound was standing on the wrong side of the door, her breath catching in her throat, watching as he latched it with a stern expression on his face.

“The silence ends here, girl.”

Her eyes grew wide and just as she did in the hall, she scanned her bedchamber for any sign of Littlefinger’s friends, but again, she saw nothing. _He can’t have eyes and ears_ **_inside_ ** _my bedchamber...can he?_ Sandor Clegane stepped towards her slowly and methodically, her hands gripping the blanket atop her featherbed much like the whore had done when he took her from behind. The steel of his armor _clanked_ with each step, adding to the apprehensive ambience of the room. 

It wasn’t long before he towered over her beside the bed, lifting her chin up using one large finger. “Talk.”

Sansa shook her head, and the finger underneath her chin became a palm, gripping her jaw not uncomfortably, sending her heart to flutter inside her chest.

“Little bird, my patience is wearing thin,” the Hound said gruffly.

Tears obscured her vision; Sansa wasn’t scared of him, she was scared of what could happen to him should she yield. _‘Pure silence’._

“What did that bastard say to you?”

As she looked up into his grey eyes, a tear slid down her cheek and into his palm. Sansa wished she could communicate with him in a single stare, silently and safely. _I have to be silent or your head will be on a spike,_ she wanted to say. Instead, she said nothing.

He huffed and removed his hand from her chin. When he turned around, Sansa thought he meant to exit the bedchamber until she observed him removing his sword belt and armor, setting the steel onto the table near the entrance. _He is going to rape me,_ she thought impulsively. Sansa’s hands unclutched the blanket and her feet met the floor, running quickly towards the privy to shut herself inside. The Hound was quicker, however, and was able to grab her hand, lift her into his arms, cradle her like a child, and toss her back onto the bed. 

Crawling on top of her, the Hound lowered his face an inch away from hers, his dark hair grazing against her cheeks while his hands pressed into the bed beside her to support his weight. He hovered over her for nearly a minute but never made an attempt to do anything else. _No, he’d never rape me,_ she realized. _He only means to scare me so I’ll talk._

Sansa listened as his breathing grew heavy despite doing nothing other than towering above her. As their eyes lingered on one another, she found herself unable to resist the closeness of him and the feelings that came along with it. Ignoring all else, her hand pressed against his firm chest just as she had done outside her bedchamber evenings ago. But this time, her lips met his. 

The kiss she had fantasized about for so many nights endured for several seconds before the Hound suddenly pushed himself off of her. “What the bloody hell are you doing?” he snapped. 

Sansa felt as humiliated as she had felt inside the brothel. Her speechlessness at that moment was not by choice; every word she had ever known faded as she watched the Hound stare at her as if _she_ had been the one to toss him onto the featherbed against his will.

“Does the little bird mistake me for one of her gallant knights?”

All she could do was clutch the hand that she had placed on his chest to her breast and shake her head, wondering how she could have misread him so poorly.

“I thought you’d start chirping as soon as my armor came off,” the Hound said far too loudly. _Someone will hear him and learn that he is inside my bedchamber...and then his head will be on a spike._ The hand that rested on her breast rose and fell rapidly with her erratic breathing, her words all but found, and in an inhibited effort to quiet him, Sansa unclutched her hand and sat up to place it over his mouth. The Hound grabbed her wrist and tore it away, pinning it against the pillow while pressing himself back on top of her. “You want me to be quiet, is that it?” his tone was softer, stirring desirable sensations between her legs, but still, he was too loud. With one hand secured against the bed and the other pinned between their chests, Sansa lifted her head and muted him with another kiss. 

Her fear of Sandor Clegane not desiring her was short-lived, for when she kissed him the second time, his body decompressed, and the grip on her wrist slackened before shifting his hand to rest alongside her face. His mouth opened and she thought he meant to speak, but soon it closed again and Sansa realized _he_ was kissing _her_. Sansa lifted the hand he had released and placed it onto the scarred side of his face as their passion for one another carried on, following his lead to match when his mouth opened and when it closed. When his tongue touched hers, Sansa gasped against his lips, and the ferocity of their embrace grew.

Soon it was not just their mouths entangled in one another. The Hound lowered his hips against hers, pressing his aroused manhood between her legs. It was as natural as breathing to open her legs wider for him, causing the skirt of her dress to draw up until the trim reached the top of her thighs. Their hips pressed against one another in synchrony and the sensation of his stiffness rubbing against her sex over her smallclothes pleasured her far better than her fingers ever could. It was nothing but pure instinct for her hand to clench tighter onto his face as she felt her smallclothes growing damp. Sandor Clegane lowered one hand onto her breasts and groped them through the fine satin fabric of her dress, teasing her nipples until they hardened, setting her loins on fire.

A throaty groan escaped him just then and triggered the memory of being forced to watch him inside the brothel, recalling the sounds he had made while thrusting inside the whore and the threat on his life that followed. 

Sansa pushed on his face to break their embrace and stared at him in horror. “Oh, gods.”

The Hound was as breathless as her. “What, little bird? Realized who you’re kissing?”

“Someone will have seen you come inside,” she whispered anxiously.

“I looked before I came in-- I didn’t see one bloody soul.” He lowered his face back onto hers, and the kisses that followed were desperate.

“He’ll put your head on a spike,” Sansa fretted against his eager mouth. 

Sandor Clegane lifted his face away and squinted at her, seemingly disorientated by their embrace. “Who?”

“Littlefinger,” she said the name like a curse. 

Sansa startled underneath him when he suddenly chuckled contemptuously, a snarling, hateful laugh. “ _Littlefinger_? Littlefinger plans to put my head on a spike? He threatened you, is that it? If you speak to me, he’ll kill me. Is that what that dumb cunt said to you?” 

When she thought of the threat and where it occurred, what was happening when it occurred, her cheeks felt like they had been lit ablaze. “He…” 

The Hound frowned. “He what?” 

The hundredth recollection of the visuals and sounds from that night bewildered her. “He took me…”

“He _took_ you?” the Hound rose from the bed and lifted her up with him to sit on his lap. “Did that bastard rape you?”

“No, he made me…” Sansa felt herself begin to hyperventilate. 

Sandor Clegane’s arms tensed around her, and he almost begged. “Made you do what, girl?” 

Sansa shut her eyes tightly to avoid his gaze and rapidly said, “He took me inside a brothel and forced me to watch you be intimate with a woman.” Although her eyes were shut, his response was just as loud in his body as it would have been on his face. 

“Littlefinger made you watch me fuck a whore?”

Wincing at the bluntness of his words, Sansa nodded her head with her eyes still closed. 

“Seven fucking bloody hells,” he cursed under his breath, “I’ll kill him. It won’t be my head shoved onto a spike, it will be his. And it’ll be me who puts it there.” 

As if they had been sewn shut, her eyes would not open. In the forced darkness, Sansa could only seem to remember how the Hound had looked and sounded inside the brothel with the woman who was not her, and despite herself, she started to cry.

The Hound’s hand brushed the side of her cheek to clear away the tears, and just as he started to mutter something softly to her, the handle on the door of her bedchamber turned without a single knock. Once met with the resistance of the latch, Sansa could hear the sound of feet scurrying down the corridor. 

_And there departs Littlefinger’s whisper._


	3. Chapter 3

It was Ser Balon Swann who guarded the door that evening during supper, not the Hound, and Sansa’s worst fears seemed to be coming true. 

Joffrey’s crossbow rested atop the table as they ate, loaded with a quarrel engraved with gold, and never had she seen the king’s mood so foul. “Lady Sansa,” he said sardonically, “do you want to guess what revolting whisper I heard today from the eunuch?”

The fork in Sansa’s hand stilled, her blue eyes slowly lifting from her plate and towards the king in front of her. “Was it about your Uncle Stannis, Your Grace?” she asked, feigning innocence.

Joffrey dropped his knife onto the plate abruptly, the clash of metal meeting porcelain startling her, and wiped his hands with a cloth. “Take another guess.”

_He knows. Why else would the Hound not be here? Joffrey knows that I kissed him, that he kissed me, and that we almost…_

“I don’t know, Your Grace. I’m not clever enough to guess such things,” Sansa said, hoping the insult to her own intelligence would please him.

It did not. Joffrey used one finger to turn his crossbow atop the table just until the head of the loaded bolt faced her at breast-level. “I said guess.”

 _The Hound’s head could be on a spike as we speak...and now mine is next._ “A whisper about the Greyjoy’s?” she asked cautiously.

Joffrey picked up the crossbow and aimed it at her face, tilting his head and squinting one eye in the process. “A whisper about a Stark.”

Sansa dropped her fork onto her plate and slid her chair back using her feet, standing up to pace backwards until she ran into the wall. The king stood just as quick, lifting the crossbow and readjusting his aim. _And now I die._ “Please, I--”

“Tell me why the eunuch informed me that the peasants of King’s Landing pray to the seven for your traitor brother to win the war,” Joffrey spat.

The words were like a song. _He doesn’t know._ The relief was so great that Sansa wanted to cry, but she dared not show it, not for one second, else she may very well become acquainted with the golden quarrel. “Your Grace, I don’t know why. They are all traitors, just like my brother and my father before him-- _you_ are the rightful king,” she lied, the false words heavy on her tongue. 

“I want you to stand in front of the sept on the morrow and proclaim your brother a traitor.”

 _In front of the Great Sept of Baelor,_ Sansa shuddered at the thought. _I’ll have to lie right where my own father was murdered, and if I don’t, Ser Ilyn will do the same to me._

“Yes, Your Grace. I will,” she surrendered.

“Now sit down,” Joffrey ordered her, placing the crossbow onto the table with such force that she thought the bolt might loosen after all. “You _will_ eat. Must I tell you again that I prefer a woman with larger teats?”

Resentfully, Sansa walked back towards her chair and sat, forcing the food into her mouth and chewing it with as much disgust as if it were raw. Although she felt relieved that Joffrey remained unawares of her passionate moment with his sworn shield, the Hound’s absence remained a mystery to her. Sansa fretted that whoever it had been trying to enter her bedchamber earlier that day _did_ send off a whisper. _Even if Littlefinger_ **_does_ ** _have friends, even if they heard us or saw us, someone would need to fight the Hound and detain him before they could shove his head onto a spike. And no one can beat the Hound,_ Sansa tried to convince herself. _No one._

More silence and scowling had passed before Joffrey finally said, “Ser Balon, escort my betrothed to her bedchambers and bring Ser Boros to stand guard for me tonight.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” the burly knight said.

 _And still no mention of the Hound_ , Sansa thought disappointedly as she rose from her seat. “Have a good night, Your Grace.” 

Joffrey pointed at her with one finger and said, “On the morrow at the sept.”

“I look forward to telling the peasants the truth, Your Grace,” she lied once more before passing through the solar’s door.

Sandor Clegane’s absence was most felt when walking back to her bedchamber. While Ser Balon was large across the chest and thick with muscle, his personality could not have been more different from the Hound. Although Balon Swann had never hit her before, Sansa only believed this to be the case because Joffrey ordered the other members of the Kingsguard to do the deed. _All except the Hound._

Upon descending the stairwell, Ser Boros Blount strode down the corridor where her bedchamber was located and spotted them, a sickening grin forming on his face. “You're escorting the little tart tonight?” the fat man asked. Sansa noticed that his eyes were fixated on her breasts before turning her attention onto the floor.

Ser Balon halted and placed his arm in front of her protectively. “His Grace has requested you to stand guard outside of his chambers tonight.”

The jowls on Ser Boros trembled when he shook his head. “Why isn’t the bloody dog guarding him?”

Sansa abruptly looked up towards Ser Boros after the mention of the Hound. Even his cruel nickname sounded sweet to her ears.

“Clegane is off duty this evening,” Ser Balon Swann explained. “He’s like to be drunk as a dog somewhere in the city by now.”

The joy she felt after hearing his name was fleeting. _Off duty, that means…_ Sansa’s attention fell back towards the floor. _Drunk and inside a brothel,_ she supposed, _with a woman who is not me...even after he kissed me._

“A drunk whoreson he is, even worse than the fucking Imp,” the fat man complained. “His Grace should remove him from the Kingsguard; the dog is not even a bloody knight.”

“He’s more a knight than you,” Sansa mumbled without forethought. Her face quickly lifted upon the foolish slight leaving her mouth, discovering that Ser Boros’ face was flushed with rage.

“What did you say, you northern whore?”

“That’s enough, Boros,” Ser Balon cautioned. “The lady has the right of it-- you beat her more than Clegane does.”

 _The Hound has never beat me,_ Sansa thought. _But he did kiss me only to go back into the city afterwards to get drunk and visit a whore. And that’s more painful than Ser Boros’ fists could ever be._

“What is she doing? Sucking your cock to have you defend her?” the fat knight scoffed. 

“It is our duty to protect His Grace, _including_ his betrothed. Unless it is an order given by our king, you’d do well not to disrespect the lady.” 

Ser Boros only grunted in response. When he continued down the corridor, he halted just beside Sansa to grab a handful of her long, auburn hair, tugging hard enough to cause her to fall onto the floor. Sansa’s elbow hit the stone forcefully, breaking the skin, the sensation of blood seeping into her sleeve instantly disercenable. Balon Swann’s steel responded to the sudden attack, the tip of the sword pointing at his Kingsguard brother’s fleshy neck.

“Are you an idiot, ser?!”

“I didn’t do anything His Grace wouldn’t approve of,” Boros said in a cool manner. 

“His Grace has requested you to shield him tonight. I suggest you leave,” Ser Balon said earnestly.

The bald knight scoffed once more before departing, the irritating sound of his feet hitting the floor like two hammers. The knight escorting her sheathed his sword and offered her his hand to stand her onto her feet. Although Sansa was grateful for Ser Balon’s gallantry, she couldn’t help but wonder what the Hound might have done if he had been the one to witness Ser Boros’ unjustified abuse.

_The Hound might have killed him for it._

“Here you are, Lady Sansa,” Balon Swann said once they approached her bedchamber.

Sansa immediately opened the door and noticed that the light inside her bedchamber was far too dim. _Has Shae not visited my chambers this evening?_ she wondered. Standing in the entrance, Sansa offered one last courtesy to the man. “Thank you, Ser Balon. You were very valiant.” she said meekly. _The Hound would have laughed at me if I said that to him, but he’s not here. He’s drunk and with a whore somewhere in this stupid city._

“You’re bleeding, my lady,” the knight said gesturing towards her elbow. She looked down at her arm and saw the blood soaking through the sapphire silk of her gown. When she bent her arm, she was met with a painful sting.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” she whimpered.

“Will my lady allow me to take a look?” 

Before she could answer, Ser Balon took her hand and rolled up her sleeve, almost sensually. When he turned over her arm to peer at her elbow, he pulled out a square cloth from his belt and wiped the skin clean. 

Sansa wished it had been the Hound. “Thank you, ser.”

“If it were up to me, my brothers would never hurt you,” he said in a soft whisper to avoid being heard. “But the king…”

Sansa pulled her hand gently out of his and rolled down her sleeve. “You’re not like the others, ser,” _and still nothing like the Hound_ , she thought. “You’ve always been courtly and modest.”

The knight smiled and Sansa realized perhaps she had complimented him too much. “I can wrap your elbow for you if you’d like.”

_He’s trying to come inside my bedchamber._

“Thank you, Ser Balon, but I can manage.”

Ser Balon Swann’s smile faded, and then he sighed. “Pleasant dreams then, Lady Sansa.” 

She feigned a smile before closing the door, latching it right after, and thanked all the gods the encounter was over.

“Valiant, is he, little bird?” a rasping voice spoke somewhere in the darkness. “Courtly and modest, too?”

Turning around with her back against the door, Sansa gasped, her eyes searching for the only man it could be inside the ill-lit room. 

“What are you doing here? I thought you’d be…”

On the far side of her bed, Sansa watched as the dark, hulking figure approached her, awaking the chaste space between her legs. 

“Drunk?” he growled. _He’s angry,_ she thought, _or perhaps he is only jealous._

“With a whore,” Sansa said shamelessly, bolder now as her arousal grew. 

Sandor Clegane waited until his body was pressed up against hers before responding, lifting her chin with his palm just as he had done earlier that day, but this time he was not gentle. “It won’t be whores I visit when I’m off duty -- not anymore.” The Hound lowered his forehead to press against her own, and Sansa could hear that he was already breathless. “You’re lucky I was here, little bird. Balon fucking Swann could have raped you bloody if he weren’t so _valiant, courtly, and modest_.”

Sansa almost smiled. “You sound jealous.”

“If he had come through this door, I would have found myself short of one brother of the Kingsguard on the morrow. What happened to your arm?”

The pain had somehow been forgotten until he mentioned it. “Ser Boros pulled me--”

“I’ll kill him.”

Wasting not a second more, their lips reunited, the kisses more fervid and longing than they had been that morning. The Hound picked her up into his arms and carried her over to the bed, his tongue brushing against hers all the while. Once at the edge, Sansa expected him to lay her onto her back, but was surprised when he sat down first, laying down to rest his head onto the pillow while guiding her legs apart to straddle him. 

It was dark in the room, but Sansa could still see the glimmer in his eyes from the soft glow of the candlelight. “Gods,” the Hound cursed, traveling his hands slowly up her thighs underneath her gown. “If having my head shoved onto a spike is the price I have to pay to be here, I’ll gladly pay it.”

Sansa pushed herself up with her hands against his chest until she sat upright and felt his manhood stiff underneath her, clouding her thoughts. “That’s not funny.”

“It’s not meant to be, little bird. I only speak the truth.”

“Someone tried to come into my bedchamber earlier and you’re not scared?”

“ _Scared_? Of Littlefinger?” the Hound chuckled too loud for her comfort. _If we weren’t caught before, we will be now._

Placing both hands over his lips, Sansa begged, the words falling from her mouth, “Please, you must be quiet. I can’t lose you.”

Two calloused hands grabbed her wrists, tearing them away from his mouth to pull her back down on top of him. Sansa could feel the rapid vibrations from his heartbeat against her breasts. “I’m not going anywhere, girl.”

When his hands traveled from her thighs and onto the curve of her ass, when his scarred lips fell into the side of her neck, when his hips bucked upwards to press his arousal against her own, Sansa no longer thought of what she had seen in the brothel nor of Littlefinger’s threat. Instead, she moaned as he kissed her skin and in a single breath she said, “Take me now.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This....got a lil dark. Check the (updated) tags before you read this chapter. If you decide to proceed, enjoy!

The sensation of silk sliding slowly down her body hardened her nipples, and the cool night air that filled the softly-lit bedchamber rose goose pimples on her skin. 

Sandor Clegane growled when she bared herself to him, the bodice of her dress falling onto his abdomen while she straddled him. “Gods,” he exhaled, groping one of her breasts with his hand. The roughest part of him caressing the softest part of her made her moan. “You’re perfect, aren’t you, little bird?” The Hound took her waist and rolled on top of her, his mouth meeting her nipple while his calloused hands removed the remaining silk covering her body, discarding it with a violent toss towards the floor. 

As he sucked on her breast, Sansa let out a brazen moan and combed her fingers through the length of his hair. His hand lowered from her breast, onto her belly, and Sansa could not refrain from jolting once it reached the thin patch of auburn curls atop her sex. The hand continued to lower, running one finger down her damp folds, lower and lower...

A thunderous knock came at the door, and then a shout. “Open the door!” 

The Hound’s hand clasped over her mouth in the same instant. “Bloody fucking hell,” he cursed in a breath beside her ear. “Don’t make a noise, girl.” 

The second knock that came was fiercer, and Sansa thought the door might split in half. “I’ll have my Kingsguard break this door down! Open the fucking door!” demanded an enraged Joffrey.

 _Ser Boros,_ she knew once he mentioned the Kingsguard. _He told Joffrey what I said to him. How could I have been so stupid?_

“Listen to me, little bird. You’re going to slip into your robe, open the door for that cunt, and see what he wants. I’ll wait in the corner until...” he trailed off. 

Sansa tried to respond, but his hand was so tight over her mouth that all she could manage was a hesitant nod.

“Look at me.” In the somber room, the Hound’s grey eyes looked black. “I love you.” 

The words would have enraptured her any other time, but not here, not now. _He plans on dying here,_ Sansa realized with horror. _As soon as one of them touches me, he’ll come out from the shadows._

The third time the fists hit the door, the wood _did_ crack. “Open the door, you stupid bitch!”

The Hound removed his hand from her mouth and lifted her from the bed. “Whatever happens, you can’t come out to help me,” Sansa begged in a hushed voice. “No matter what. You’ll be killed.”

“If those fuckers touch--”

“I love you,” she confessed, the most pleasant string of words to ever leave her mouth. “I will not have you die here. Promise me, Sandor.”

When his hands held her face, Sansa wondered if it would be the last time. “They’ll beat you bloody,” his voice quivered.

“Ser Meryn, Ser Mandon, break it open!”

“They’ll do it anyway after they kill you. They beat me every day, it’s nothing to me anymore. Just promise me,” she whispered harshly, the blaring destruction of the door drowning out her voice.

The Hound kissed her mouth so hard she almost moaned. “I promise.”

Sansa ran and grabbed the robe that was draped over the chair beside her vanity, wrapping it around her nude body as she made for the door. Before she could reach for the handle, the wood yielded, and the dim light from the torches in the corridor spilled inside. Sansa looked over her shoulder, fretting the light might reach the far end of the room, but nowhere could she see Sandor.

The door did not open, it fell, and Sansa had to pace backwards several steps in order to avoid being hit by the splintered wood. In the entrance stood an exasperated Joffrey and his remaining Kingsguard, the only member missing hiding somewhere in the shadows of her room.

“You dare defy me, you bitch?!” Joffrey shouted. “Ser Balon, grab her and keep her still so Ser Boros can show me what I missed.” 

_He won’t do it, he’s not like the rest,_ she thought. When the burly member of the Kingsguard strode inside with an irate expression, Sansa realized she had only been a stupid little fool. The knight forced her to stand in front of him, his thick hands clenched tightly onto her shoulders, forbidding her to move. _It was all only an act, him defending me, helping me...an act all so he could get inside my bedchamber. And I denied him. Now he issues his revenge._

Joffrey entered dressed in the same crimson velvet he wore at supper with the remainder of his retinue of Ser Boros, Ser Mandon, and Ser Meryn, the knights all garbed in their white cloaks, helms, and suits of white enameled scales. “Go on, Ser Boros,” the king said smugly with his arms crossed.

 _Take the beating and then they’ll leave,_ she told herself. _If you fight back, they’ll only stay longer, and Sandor…._

Ser Boros’ fist slammed into her abdomen with as much force as his feet met the ground, stealing all the breath she held in her lungs. Sansa instinctively wanted to fall onto the ground and clutch her belly, but Balon Swann’s tight grip on her shoulders forced her to stand up.

“Speaking ill to my Kingsguard is speaking ill to me!” Joffrey squawked. “Ser Meryn, hit her!” 

Ser Boros shifted over just enough to allow Ser Meryn to stand in front of her, slapping her face once to the left, and a second time to the right with his steel-armored glove. Sansa could taste the blood, but not as much as she could taste her growing fury.

“Ser Mandon, your turn.” The dead-faced knight pressed forward between the others and punched her in the exact spot Ser Boros had followed by adding in a third slap to the face.

Sansa whimpered each time she was hit, she even let the tears that were a product of her resentment fall, but not once did she scream; Joffrey was noticeably displeased by that.

“You no longer fear my men,” he noted with disdain. “Once you would have wailed if one so much as approached you.” Joffrey sat in the chair beside her vanity and appeared to be deep in thought. The silence that followed was utterly foreboding. “I’ve never cared to marry a maiden-- Ser Balon, remove her robe.”

A gasp escaped her. _They’re no longer going to beat me, they’re going to rape me._ “No!” Sansa finally cried out.

Joffrey smiled once he heard the scream. “I’ll allow each of you to fuck her just this once,” the king explained to the four suddenly eager men. “Perhaps then my betrothed will discover a newfound fear and respect for my Kingsguard.”

The knight she once thought to be valiant, courtly, and modest tore her robe down the middle of her back until the silk fell down by her feet. 

“And whoever finishes first, go and find my dog. I’d like to watch him have a turn,” Joffrey said far too desirably.

Ser Balon dragged her by her hair over to the bed, bending her over the mattress until her face was pressed into the blanket. Sansa tried kicking at him but only ended up bruising her foot against the armored suit.

“Turn her around,” Ser Meryn demanded hungrily. Sansa listened to the men behind her remove their armor, the clattering of the enameled whites scales against the ground sending chills down her spine. “I want to watch those teats bounce.”

Sansa lifted her head an inch and fixated her eyes onto the shadowed corner of the room where she could see the faintest outline of the Hound. _None of them can see him, they’re all too focused on raping me._ Even then, she prayed Sandor would stay hidden. “Don’t,” she cried out to him, knowing his eyes were locked onto hers. _Don’t come forward. Not even now._ Joffrey chuckled at her cry, foolishly thinking she was speaking to the men who would take her by force.

“Fuck you, Meryn. I’d rather watch her ass,” said Ser Mandon Moore.

“Fuck all of you bastards,” spat Ser Boros. “I’ll fuck her first.”

“I’m the one who escorted her tonight, it should be me,” Ser Balon chimed in, pressing his hand into her back while the other worked on removing his suit.

“If we go in order of who escorts her the most, go get Clegane. That drunk bastard would be first.”

“Fuck him!”

“Oh, enough!” Joffrey howled. Sansa turned her head towards the voice and discovered that the king was sitting slumped in the chair with his right hand inside his crimson velvet trousers, stroking slowly. “Ser Boros will go first since she slighted him this evening. Now quit the griping and fuck her!”

Sansa’s eyes closed tightly once she felt Ser Boros’ fleshy hands squeeze onto her hips just before placing himself behind her, the fabric of his trousers the only thing separating his flesh from hers. Just then, she heard the whisper of steel leaving its sheath, yet none of the men seemed to hear it. _They’re not listening to anything but my cries._ Sansa lifted her head up towards the sound and saw a quick, faint glimmer inside the shadows as the Hound slowly approached along the wall. _He was waiting for them to remove their armor,_ she realized. _He lied to me...he’s going to kill them. And he’ll die in the attempt._

Just before Sandor would have left the shadows to reveal himself, the sound of footsteps shuffling beside the entrance became audible. And then another sword left its sheath. “Ser Boros, if your cock touches Lady Sansa, I’ll have Bronn here slice it clean off.”

Joffrey stood abruptly from the chair, pulling up his trousers with a frown. “Uncle, I order you to leave at once!”

“Bronn, give Lady Sansa your cloak,” Tyrion instructed, ignoring his nephew’s demand. “And kill whoever gets in your way.”

Ser Boros’ hands released from her hips upon the threat, allowing her to crawl as far as she could across the bed. The thick, jet cloak fell into her lap once the sellsword tossed it to her, and though it smelled like blood, nothing had ever smelled more pleasant as she wrapped it about her shoulders. The men of the Kingsguard had never been so still, not even in court. Sansa’s eyes met the entrance, observing Tyrion’s squire, Podrick Payne, along with the master of whisperers, Lord Varys. The latter stared at her intently, not out of lust like the other men in the room, but knowingly.

“My betrothed was to be punished, uncle,” Joffrey said through gritted teeth.

“Lady Sansa is a maiden, your future wife, and you would have had your entire Kingsguard rape her?!”

“Not the _entire_ Kingsguard...my dog isn’t here,” the king mumbled, staring at his feet like a misbehaved child.

Sansa watched Tyrion waddle across the room to slap Joffrey four times in a row. “Four slaps for the four cocks you would have defiled the lady with, you sadistic little shit!”

Joffrey clutched the side of his face that was now as crimson as the velvet he wore. “I’ll tell mother!”

“Go, you fool! Go tell her you meant to have your betrothed gang raped by the same men sworn to protect her!” the dwarf shouted, more infuriated than Sansa had ever seen him. Tyrion shifted his attention towards the men of the Kingsguard and scowled. “Pick up your armor and the cloak that none of you have the right to wear, and get out!”

The men went from being as still as stone to moving so quickly that they became a blur, grabbing their removed garments from the ground and stomping out the broken doorway. 

“Lady Sansa, I…” Tyrion began before trailing off, shaking his head abashedly. “I have no words. _This_ will never happen again, ever. I assure you.” The Lannister dwarf turned towards the king who had been glowering at her. “Nephew, with me,” was all he said before departing. The golden-haired king followed behind him grudgingly. Afterwards, Tyrion’s squire and his sellsword companion followed, but Lord Varys remained.

The plump, bald eunuch stepped lightly over the ruin of a door, and said, “Tell your lover that he may come out.”

_It’s him...he’s Littlefinger’s friend._

Sansa froze and nearly dropped the cloak she had wrapped about her breasts. “What?”

“I know, Lady Sansa. You need not lie.” The room smelled of lavender as he approached.

“I don’t know what you are referring to, my lord.” Sansa clutched her arms to her abdomen, the skin tender and bruising from the beating she had received. 

Lord Varys glanced towards the shadowed wall where the Hound remained and smiled. “I know all the happenings inside these walls, my lady-- outside them, too. You worry that _I_ am Littlefinger’s friend, but I can assure you, nothing is farther from the truth. His friends are dead.”

Sansa surveyed the round, hairless face and somehow knew it was not a lie. Her head turned towards the shadow, and she whispered, “Sandor.”

Stepping forth into the dim light that poured in through the void where her door should have been, the Hound sheathed his sword quickly, longingly returning by her side. 

“Oh, seven fucking hells,” he groaned. His lips met hers ravenously, desperately as if Lord Varys were not there at all. “I’ll kill them all, I’ll kill them all.”

In a soft whisper, the eunuch interrupted the lovers’ embrace. “You are to announce your brother as a traitor in front of the Great Sept of Baelor on the morrow,” he stated as fact. “The truth is, my lady, I heard no such whisper. Although I would assume many do pray for your brother’s success. I gave the king his false whisper and instructed him on how to proceed. And now, the two of you will find yourselves outside of the Red Keep on the morrow. _Together_.”

Sandor squinted at Lord Varys. “You _serve_ the bloody king, and you expect us to trust you?”

“I serve the _realm_ ,” Lord Varys corrected him, “and the realm will shatter under Joffrey’s reign,” he sighed. “Lady Sansa, Lord Baelish is infatuated with you, but you are also an important piece in his plan, a plan that _must not_ happen. He has travelled to secure an alliance with Highgarden; Joffrey will marry Margarey Tyrell, Renly’s widow, and once that happens…”

“He’ll kill me,” Sansa breathed. 

Lord Varys gave her a pitiful look. “Not intentionally, my lady, but the abuse you will face once he no longer needs you to bear him an heir will likely end with the same result if Lord Baelish’s plan to extract you from the city fails. What could have happened here tonight may very well happen every night.”

“I’ll kill them all, every last bloody one of them,” Sandor repeated in the deepest, cruelest tone she had ever heard.

“Yes, you will,” the eunuch agreed pleasantly. “Tomorrow. The realm will prosper without them. And afterwards, you will take the lady as far away from here as you can.”

“How can he?” Sansa interposed. “There will be hundreds of people in front of the sept. How can we leave unseen?”

Varys smiled at her as if the answer to the question was entirely too obvious. “My little birds do more than whisper, Lady Sansa. They stir.”

“Stir?” The Hound scoffed. “Stir what?”

Lord Varys folded his soft, white hands just before exhaling two haunting words. “A riot.”


	5. Chapter 5

“M’lady, the powder will not hide the bruises,” her maid sighed sympathetically, “not _these_ bruises.” 

Sitting in a different chair from the one Joffrey had tried to pleasure himself in during her attempted rape the evening prior, Sansa examined herself in the looking glass on her vanity. _Two bruised cheeks and a cut lip. And if today’s plan fails, this will only be the beginning._

“It’s all right, Shae. It’s better than it was before.” Sansa stood from the chair, wincing at the latest pains in her body, and smoothed out her gown, crimson and gold per request of Joffrey. _He wants me to look as Lannister as he is when I denounce my brother in front of the city._ The mere thought sickened her. _I am a Stark, always a Stark._

It was an hour before midday when Joffrey arrived in her doorless bedchamber entrance. Sansa noticed that he carried bruises of his own from Tyrion’s chastisement, perhaps even his mother’s, though she doubted it. His bruises, however, were far less severe than hers and were nearly fully concealed with the powder. Behind the tyrant king stood the Hound clad in his soot-dark armor and white Kingsguard cloak, holding his snarling dog’s head helm underneath one arm. When his eyes fell on her, on her bruises, on the Lannister-themed dress she wore, Sansa could see his burning desire to kill. 

_He’ll kill them all-- Varys said it, and he did, too. At the onset of the riot, the Hound will lead me, Joffrey, and the Kingsguard behind the sept, down the nearest alleyway, and into the last chamber on the right. It is_ **_there_ ** _that Varys said to kill them all. And afterwards, Sandor and I will leave this city behind. Unless..._

“A comely gown, my lady,” Joffrey said, the compliment leaving his lips as foreign to her as High Valyrian.

Sansa would have picked up her chair and thrown it at him if she could, but she knew he’d be dead soon enough. That made it easier for her to mutter, “Thank you, Your Grace.”

Joffrey stepped back to look down the corridor as if to make sure no one was lingering about before he continued. “Flattering on your curves, too. I can almost see how your ass looked bent over your bed last night,” he chuckled menacingly. “You should have seen it, dog. Perhaps when my uncle retires for the night I’ll have you bring her to my bedchamber along with the other men. Lady Sansa, what say you? Can my Hound fuck you?”

 _Yes, he can,_ she thought. _He would have last night had my door not been destroyed. But tonight when you are dead and Sandor and I are outside of these gates, he finally will._

Instead of saying that, as tempting as it was, Sansa did her best to look frightened and shook her head. 

“Too bad,” Joffrey said smugly. “Now, come-- you and I will travel by palanquin; those peasants will rip us down from our horses should we ride. But fear not, my lady. I’ll be sure my Kingsguard rides beside us all the while.” The bruised king grinned as sinisterly as ever before turning on his heel to exit the doorless entrance. 

Sandor remained for one brief second, and with his sullen grey eyes, the eyes that were begging to kill all who had harmed her, he told her he loved her.

  
  


* * *

The sun sat directly above the Great Sept of Baelor by the time she stood on the marble steps, the same marble steps where her father had taken his last breath and said his final prayer. The reflection of the sun rays against the white marble plaza made it difficult for her to keep her eyes open. Sansa squinted at the statue of Baelor that stood in the middle of the plaza and thought it almost resembled her father. 

“My eldest brother, Robb Stark, has proclaimed himself the King in the North, and like my late father, Eddard Stark, he is a traitor.” _It’s all a lie,_ she thought. _That’s all it ever is. False words and false smiles. It’s all fake, except when I’m with the Hound._

“She’s bruised! They’ve beat her to say this!” shouted one observant Kingslander in the sea of attendees in front of the sept. The plaza was full of faces, dark, light, young, old, bald, hairy, beautiful, and ugly. The bells had tolled every minute for an hour prior to Sansa’s pronouncement, and to her, it looked like the entire city had heeded the call, seemingly thousands fitting atop Visenya’s Hill.

At the bottom of the steps, a barrier was composed of the City Watch, lined up shoulder-to-shoulder, forbidding the Kingslanders from stepping forward from the plaza. At the height of the steps, Sansa stood beside Joffrey, his golden crown gleaming from the overbearing sun, and beside him stood his mother, Cersei Lannister. To her surprise, Tyrion Lannister had not come. Sansa wondered if he could have known about the riot that was to occur, but as acting Hand of the King, perhaps he simply did not want to waste his time encouraging Joffrey’s impulsive spectacles. _Or perhaps he didn’t want to die._

Behind them, just in front of the sept’s entrance, stood the four vile Kingsguard, each clad in their white enameled suit that glinted in the sunlight, helm on, right hand resting on the hilt of their sword. The Hound had positioned himself so that he stood directly behind her, clad in his typical soot-dark armor and singularly crafted helm. Sansa had looked over her shoulder at him when they first arrived and a fleeting smile played on her lips despite the gravity of the situation, despite her near rape the evening prior, despite knowing that a riot would break out at any moment and they could die. There was something about the Hound fully armored, helm included, that made Sansa visit the most wicked and provocative parts of her mind. _It’ll be him and I after this, and then, we can finally..._ The kittenish smile that had formed at the thought was reckless and though it lasted but only a second, Sansa saw Ser Boros’ helm glimmer when he had turned to watch her.

“Shame on you!” shouted another commoner. “Decrying your own father and now your own brother!”

“Bastard’s whore!”

Each time someone spoke out against the king, a gold cloak would jab his way through the crowd and find the perpetrator, slicing their throats on the spot and leaving their bodies to lay amongst the others as a grim reminder of where that would get them. The Kingslanders would silence momentarily after each gruesome execution, allowing Sansa the opportunity to spew out another lie.

_Lies and silence, silence and lies._

“My betrothed, Joffrey Baratheon, is the one true king,” Sansa added to her inventory of falsehoods. “Stannis Baratheon, Balon Greyjoy, and my brother, Robb Stark, are traitors and should be denounced as such.”

Upon her final proclamation, the front row, which Sansa had noticed had been unusually still the duration of her deliverance, suddenly moved in unison, each man, woman, and child reaching into their sleeves or pockets to unveil daggers, the blades glimmering like diamonds underneath the sun. In the duration of a sharp breath they pressed forward, each commoner impaling the gut, face, or neck of a gold cloak at the bottom of the steps, nearly fifty of them falling onto the marble ground at once.

_The riot begins._

Sansa staggered at the sight of blood on the marble, a triggering reminder of her own father’s death, and lost her footing. Before she could impact the ground, the Hound who had rushed forward at the onset of the violence, wrapping one steel arm securely around her waist. 

The four rapists of the Kingsguard ripped their swords from their sheaths and surrounded Joffrey, enclosing him in a white circle, their helms glistening wildly with their frantic movements. _The riot is under way. Now to get them behind the sept._

“Don’t just stand there, you dumb cunts!” Sandor Clegane shouted to his false brothers, gesturing them to follow him.

“Joffrey!” Cersei shouted, surrounded by a second wave of no less than fifty gold cloaks and Janos Slynt, the lord commander of the City Watch, “Joffrey, come!” 

The craven king looked at his men and then at his mother, and in a split decision, pushed past Ser Boros Blount to run towards the larger line of defense. 

Sansa’s eyes grew wide. _Joffrey was supposed to come with us behind the sept. He was supposed to die here._

“You fucking bastards!” The Hound shouted. “You let your king go!”

“He’s got the City Watch, dog!” shouted Ser Boros. “But we’re like to die in this bloody mob!”

Sansa looked ahead and discovered that Boros Blount was not exaggerating; the front row that had killed the first line of gold cloaks were now attacking every guard and member of Joffrey’s retinue, ascending up the steps in the process.

“Follow me, you buggering cravens!” Sandor Clegane picked her up with one arm and pressed forward behind the sept where Lord Varys had instructed him to take the men, despite being short of Joffrey. They passed two buildings until an alley appeared, and entered the last storage chamber on the right. The windows inside allowed in some light, but it was still dusky, and Sansa found herself growing apprehensive. _How can the Hound fight four men if he can hardly see?_

Upon entering, the Hound set her down just beside the entrance, closing and latching the door behind him. Afterwards, he returned his arm around her waist firmly, waiting for the right moment to strike. Despite her not having ran, Sansa was more breathless than any of the other men, her trepidation growing each second that she stood in the dreary chamber.

“We are waiting here until it passes over,” Ser Meryn said. _Not only is he abusive and a rapist, he is a craven._

“That’ll be the better part of the afternoon,” Ser Balon groaned.

“I know how we can pass the time,” Boros Blount said malevolently, eyeing Sansa. Sandor’s arm tightened around her.

Mandon Moore sheathed his sword and removed his helm. “His Grace gave us that order last night. He’s like to geld us if we fuck her now.” 

“We’ll tell him the bloody peasants fucked her. Who do you think he’ll believe? As long as we bring the whore back alive, I do not think he’ll care.” It was all the fat knight needed to say to persuade the other three men, and just like the evening prior, their helms, sword belts and armor started to drop onto the ground.

“Clegane, bring the tart here. Our blood is still up from last night so we’ll go first. You can have whatever is left,” Ser Boros guffawed.

The Hound pulled her behind him, blinding her from the other men. “You come over here, you die.”

Sansa peeked around his arm and observed the four Kingsguard men staring at one another as if they had their own language, one that was wordless, silent. The quietude inside the dim room invoked deep dread, and in the distance, Sansa listened as the riot endured.

The jowls on Boros Blount shook when he boomed with derisive laughter. “You’re _fucking_ her, aren’t you, dog? I saw the little smirk the whore gave you out there.”

“Say that word again,” Sandor threatened. 

Ser Meryn tsked. “I look forward to watching Ser Ilyn behead you. Perhaps if you give us a turn, we’ll decide not to tell His Grace.”

“Come get your turn then,” the Hound said, his deep, rasping voice echoing inside his helm. 

“Her cunt must be honey sweet if you’re willing to kill your own brothers just to keep it for yourself,” Ser Mandon spat.

The Hound’s grip tightened around the hilt of his longsword and the men tensed in synchrony. “I only have one brother, and I’ll kill him, too.”

“Four against one,” Boros Blount chuckled, but Sansa could hear the apprehensiveness in it. “That doesn’t seem fair.”

“It’s not,” Sandor agreed, “for you.”

Like the release of a trebuchet, Sandor Clegane strode forward, approaching the vulnerable Kingsguard men while they rushed to pick up their swords. Sansa paced backwards until she felt the warm stone wall against the nape of her neck, wishing, praying, begging for the Hound to kill the men without taking a fatal blow himself. 

In his first swing, his longsword sliced off both of Meryn Trant’s hands at the wrists just as he rose from the ground. When the limbs fell onto the stone beneath his feet, Sansa discovered that his right hand was still squeezed around the hilt of his sword. Before the Hound could strike another blow, Ser Balon’s steel struck him just short of space between his breastplate and his helm. Had it been an inch higher, Sandor would be dead, and Sansa soon after. 

Blocking an oncoming attack from Ser Mandon with the flat of his sword, Sandor simultaneously kicked Balon Swann’s unarmored knee in, forcing the burly knight to fall onto the ground and smack his head against the wall. The Hound had to duck swiftly when Ser Mandon whipped around to bury the steel in his exposed neck. Just as he did, Sandor thrusted his sword upwards, the blade piercing into Mandon Moore’s abdomen and out between his shoulders. Sansa had never seen the dead-faced knight so expressive. _More expressive when dying than he ever was living._

Before the Hound could rip Ser Mandon’s body from his longsword, Balon Swann rose again and took one muscled hand to rip off the Hound’s helm. Sansa gasped and covered her mouth, and only then realized that Ser Boros had not yet attacked. The fat knight stood behind a bleeding-out Meryn Trant, wary of joining the fight, making no effort to help his brothers.

A deep grunt escaped Sandor when he pulled his arm back, his sword sliding from the flesh, now dripping and saturated with Ser Mandon’s blood. He lifted the crimson steel immediately, clashing against Ser Balon’s brute attack. The sword’s embrace resulted in a sharp, piercing sound that reverberated inside the stone walls. Sansa’s hands rushed to cover her ears to block the maddening cacophony, her eyes shutting in instinctively, blunderingly.

It was a second later, perhaps even less, when Sansa heard the words that turned her blood cold. “Don’t you fucking touch her!” 

The same fleshy hand that had gripped her hip the night before now grabbed her throat and her eyes shot open to find Ser Boros pointing a dagger at her neck, forcing her to stand in front of him as his hostage. Sansa hardly noticed that Ser Balon was impaled on the Hound’s steel, the falsely valiant knight now still and lifeless. Using his foot, Sandor kicked the limp Balon Swann back to free his steel, the burly man’s body falling on top of a pale-faced Ser Mandon and a handless, dead Ser Meryn. 

“I’ll slit her fucking throat if you take one more step,” Boros threatened, pressing the blade against her skin. Sansa noticed his hands were shaking.

“You do that, and I’ll skin you alive,” the Hound growled.

Boros Blount pressed the blade deeper and Sansa felt a trickle of blood. “I’m taking your _whore_ back to the king, and you’ll stay right here, dog. If I hear your armor so much as shift, I’ll press this blade one inch closer to her spine.”

 _It’s over,_ Sansa realized dejectedly. _Lord Varys’ plan failed, and now…._

“Sandor, you need to leave,” she pleaded, despite the edge at her throat. “Joffrey will kill you for what you’ve done.”

With his helm removed, never had she seen Sandor Clegane so pained, so conflicted, so defeated. “Give me the girl, and I’ll let you live.”

Boros Blount spat on the ground. “If I return without her, it’ll be on my hands. I’ll be executed, or worse, sent to the bloody Wall. No, she comes with me.”

The memory of her father being murdered in front of her was the most haunting of Sansa’s life. The second would be the memory of watching the man she loved come to the realization that he would have to let her go to let her live. 

“I’ll come after you,” the Hound rasped to Ser Boros. “I’ll spend every bloody waking moment coming to kill you.”

“Leave,” Sansa begged him, her vision blurring as tears welled up and fell. 

“That’s enough,” Ser Boros grunted. “Go.” Sansa took one last look at the Hound before the knight unlatched the door and shoved her forward into the alleyway. Each step she took the blade chafed her neck, but it was practically painless compared to the agony she felt knowing she would never see the Hound again. _He can never return to King’s Landing, and I’ll be stuck here as Joffrey’s plaything until the day I die._

Echoing in the alleyway were the sounds of the Hound’s steel clashing against brick and stone and flesh inside the chamber, maddened with rage by the failure. The accompanying sounds came from the area around the Great Sept of Baelor, the riot all but over. Sansa could feel Ser Boros looking over his shoulder nearly every other step, watching to see if Sandor would risk it all to take her back. But the Hound knew as well as her that Boros’ threat was not hollow. And Sansa knew that he would never risk her life to prove otherwise.

Once outside the alley, Boros pushed Sansa towards a small stable where the Kingsguard’s horses had been left nearby the sept. Just as they approached, two young stragglers from the riot spotted them, each with a blade in their hand, wet and dripping with blood.

“If you run, I’ll kill you,” Ser Boros threatened her before removing the blade from her throat. Dropping the dagger, the fat knight unsheathed his sword to meet the oncoming attack from the commoners. Sansa took a step back, and then another, watching to see if he would notice. His steel pierced through one of the the rioters ribs, but the other straggler jumped onto his back and shoved his blade deep into the back of Boros Blount’s skull, killing him instantly.

The surviving rioter who couldn't have been older than her little sister, Arya, gave her one glance, but made no attempt on her life. _Varys' little birds...his whispers._ Quicker than she ever thought she was capable of, Sansa turned back around towards the alleyway and ran. It was as if the world had gone quiet in that moment; all Sansa could hear was the sound of her ragged breathing, the staccato beat of her heeled shoes against the stones, and the frantic pounding of her heartbeat, desperate, yearning to get back to him.

Sansa turned the corner to return to the alley and crashed into soot-dark armor. 


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smut...

In the midst of the chaos, accompanied by shouts, screams, and cries off in the distance, Sansa wrapped her arms around the armor that had halted her stride, and without even looking, stood as tall as she could to kiss him. 

The Hound tensed up at first, as if he couldn’t believe it was her, but soon his embrace was prodigious. Underneath the mid-afternoon sun, he lifted her up with one steel arm and held her so tightly she thought he would never let go again. 

When the sound of gold cloaks shouting orders approached closer, Sandor pulled her back into the alleway and inside a smaller room much darker than the one three of Joffrey’s Kingsguard now lay dead. There was no latch on the door, so he found the nearest, heaviest object to prop against it: a modestly sized table that was covered in the same rushes that were spread out across the floor. Sansa sat on the edge of a second table while he secured the entrance, and before he could object, before the door would come crashing down again once again, Sansa removed her shoes and pulled down her hose, smallclothes included.

 _Is this how men feel after battle?_ Sansa wondered. _When their blood is up from being so close to death, when all they loved was nearly lost, is this how they feel?_

The wanton desire to have him was deeper than the bruising on her face, more painful than the aching in her core, sharper than the cut on her throat. Just like the four men meant to take her in the course of the disarray near the sept, Sansa had felt a similar hunger, but unlike them, Sansa need not use force.

Sandor Clegane turned from securing the door to find her sitting atop the table, barefoot, her dress bundled in her lap while her bare legs dangled playfully off the edge, longing for him to approach. His former expression of torment and defeat when Ser Boros had placed the blade at her throat was now replaced with an aching lust, a thirst perhaps even greater than her own. Two long strides brought him to her, and from there, he leaned on top of her until her back was pressed against the wood. The kisses that followed were devouring and all-consuming.

“We need to get to the gates, little bird,” he growled against her mouth.

Sansa’s hand tugged at the brooch fastening his white Kingsguard cloak, discarding it onto the rushes below. “I’ll not wait.”

The sound the Hound’s armor made as it fell onto the rushes was like a symphony, soft and poetic, compared to the dissonance the Kingsguard mens’ steel had produced in their two attempts to rape her. Sansa struggled with the stubborn laces on her gold and crimson dress, a dress she would have rather burned than wear. Sandor took the liberty of removing the Lannister gown for her, pulling the fitted sleeves down her arms, the tight bodice down her torso, and tossing the cursed garment aside once he slid it past her legs. As she laid naked as her nameday underneath him, he stilled. The Hound stood tall and looked down at her maiden body spread out for him against the table, but it was not lust she read in his eyes, it was agony. 

_The bruises._ In between the riot, the fight between Sandor and the Kingsguard, and the passionate moment she lived in now, Sansa had forgotten about the dark contusions on her belly from the beating last night. 

His hunger abated for a brief moment to gently brush his fingertips over the evidence of her abuse. “The day I leave this world and go to hell, I’ll find those bastards and kill them all over again.”

The dark words ravished her. Sansa lowered her hand onto his and pushed the calloused fingertips that grazed her slowly down until they met her auburn maidenhair. The palm of his hand was warm and chafed, stained with blood despite having worn gloves in combat, yet the touch against her purity was more than just welcome, it was desired. A moan escaped her as he rubbed her wet folds, first with his palm, then with two fingers, and soon, Sansa felt one press inside.

“Fucking hell,” he said, almost painfully. “I won’t be able to last when I’m in you, girl.”

Her back arched against the table, grinding her hips on his hand while he teased her entrance. As he slid one thick finger in and out of her, she felt her legs becoming numb. When the sensation grew overwhelming, knowing she was on the cusp of peaking, Sansa pushed herself up to sit and tugged on his trousers with one hand.

The Hound squeezed her wrist with a tight grip, and Sansa could feel her arousal seeping out onto the wooden table beneath her at the touch. “Eager, little bird?”

Sansa looked up at him with her vivid blue eyes pleadingly. “Stop teasing me.”

“ _Teasing_?” he scoffed. In one fluid motion, Sandor pushed her back onto the table and reached into his trousers to pull out his stiff cock. “I’m not teasing you, girl. I only know that once I’m inside you, it’ll be over.”

Sansa moaned wantonly once she felt the thick, warm tip of his manhood rubbing up and down between her folds, spreading the slickness that spilled from her entrance. “Then we’ll do it again tonight,” she breathed, “and the morning after, and every day and every night after that.” Above, she felt the viciousness of his kiss on her lips, and below, she experienced the most gratifying pain once he steadily pressed his hips forward. Her hands unconsciously pushed against his muscled chest as more of his length filled her, but all the while, Sansa begged, “Don’t stop, please.”

A thick, husky groan echoed inside the room when the Hound guided his cock deeper inside, a satisfied groan that Sansa had never heard when she was forced to watch him take the whore inside the brothel. “Bloody hell,” he exhaled against her mouth.

Compared to the beatings she had received nearly every day for months, the pain of losing her maidenhead was meager. Sansa squeezed her fingers into the broadness of his shoulders once she felt the sting, but welcomed the pain, urging him on by kissing his lips, his scars, and wrapping her legs around him. Sandor took in a breath before withdrawing his cock slowly from her tight embrace and groaned again even deeper. When his hips drove forward again, sending himself fully back inside her sex, they moaned together. _Someone will hear,_ she thought. _They will find us._ But not even that could stop her. 

The Hound’s pace would quicken and then slow, and Sansa could tell that he was holding his breath, likely in an effort to refrain from peaking. The thought of him obtaining so much pleasure from her sent Sansa on the verge of climaxing herself. Before she allowed herself to come undone, she memorized every sound, touch, smell, taste, and sight she could. Sansa savored the wet sounds that were produced when his cock filled her, the touch of his rough hand gripping onto one of her breasts while the other bounced with every thrust, the earthy smell of his dark hair as it fell in her face, the taste of his tongue on her own, and the sight of him towering above her as she lay on her back, giving herself over to Sandor Clegane inside an abandoned chamber somewhere in the depths of King’s Landing. The awareness of it all brought her to an inevitable, enthralling climax.

Sansa was still moaning from her pleasure when Sandor met his own end, producing a guttural moan of his own just beside her ear. Her legs tightened around his torso when she felt his cock shooting his seed inside of her, a singular, most titillating sensation, one that she was eager to feel again. _And I will,_ she thought. _Tonight, and every night after._

Their peaks left them breathless, sweating, and incapactiated. Sandor rested the scarred side of his face between her breasts, rising and falling with each quick breath, and Sansa soon found herself dozing off atop the table. However, an erupting sound of guards and rioters shouting off in the distance brought her back to reality. _If someone finds us...if someone finds Joffrey’s dead Kingsguard…._

Begrudgingly, she said in one exhausted breath, “We need to go.”

Sandor groaned weakly. “Which gate did that eunuch say to leave again?”

Sansa pushed his face from her breast and squinted at him. “The Lion Gate. Are you all right?” 

His mouth fell back between her breasts, licking both of her nipples to make her moan one last time before saying, “Not after that, girl.” 

* * *

The two lovers had dressed, exited the alley, and were quickly making their way towards the stables hand-in-hand after their reckless moment of passion. Sansa half expected the structure to be up in flames or the horses inside to have been stolen or killed during the ongoing riot, however, it stood seemingly untouched, unscathed. As the sounds of chaos drifted, Sansa presumed that the Kingslanders were now headed towards the Red Keep. _Perhaps Joffrey_ **_will_ ** _die today,_ she hoped. 

As they approached to retrieve Sandor’s horse, Ser Boros Blount’s dead body, along with many others scattered about, laid on the outskirts of the stables. The Hound paused for a brief moment beside him, looking down at his former brother of the Kingsguard, and then lifted his foot to crush in his bald head. Sansa was not horrified in the least bit.

The two entered the stables and chanced upon two Kingslander children inside one of the stalls with daggers in their hands. Sandor would have likely cut them down had the two not stepped aside, allowing them to continue to reach his stallion. 

“Are those--”

“Varys’ little birds,” Sansa whispered. 

Sandor snorted derisively. “Children with blades.”

“They killed Ser Boros, _and_ they kept your horse safe,” she said.

“My little bird defends the other little birds, does she?” When she pouted at him, he smirked.

The Hound’s jet black courser was inside the last stall, violent and utterly restless, until he saw his master. The warhorse tamed quickly, and became as gentle as any mare. “Get on, girl.” Once his hands wrapped around her waist and lifted her onto the saddle, Sansa whimpered at the tenderness between her legs. Inside her smallclothes, she could feel his seed gradually spilling out, along with her own fluids and maiden’s blood. Sansa smiled to herself, the sensation a beautiful reminder of their lovemaking. The Hound mounted behind her after putting on his helm, stirring the same provocative thoughts she had in front of the sept. _Perhaps tonight he can take me with_ **_that_ ** _on._ The erotic image of it in her head made her blush.

Disarray was everywhere, as were the bodies. _Did Lord Varys intend on the riot becoming this ruinous?_ she wondered. _And if Joffrey lives, was it all for nothing?_

At the Lion Gate, the gold cloaks, “Lions” as referred to by the Kingslanders, were at their posts, but each of them was lifeless, blood seeping out from various parts of their bodies, and the gate wide open.

“How many bloody assassin children does the eunuch have?” Sandor asked.

Sansa hardly heard him over the sight of freedom in front of her. _King’s Landing was hell to me. Here my father died. Here I was beaten and nearly raped twice. But it brought me Sandor Clegane. And now, we leave at last._

The stallion picked up into a steady gallop and departed the gate. The air seemed sweeter outside the city, the sun gentler, and Sansa was so engrossed in the environment around her, completely intoxicated by the sensation of his seed still inside her, the pleasant aching between her legs from their lovemaking, the solidity of the Hound’s armor behind her, that not once did she see the group of men ahorse near the grove of trees, nor did she see the archer, not until a quarrel loosed and Sandor’s horse fell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...and angst.


	7. Chapter 7

Sansa awoke to the sensation of someone stroking her hair and smelled the scent of mint in the air. 

Her blue eyes fluttered open to find a new door, a latched door, the door to her bedchamber inside the Red Keep. 

The realization sent her screaming. “No!”

A shushing sound came from beside her, and Sansa knew that when she turned it would not be Sandor Clegane she would see.

_The men, the archer, the quarrel, Stranger. We fell. And after that..._

“Sansa.” The voice was as unsettling as the sound her father’s greatsword had made when Ser Ilyn Payne sliced it through his neck.

Sitting beside her, clad in a black velvet doublet with grey sleeves and a sliver mockingbird pin clasping the grey silk cloak, was Lord Petyr Baelish. Sansa tore off the blanket, jumped from the bed and despite the sharp pain awaking in her ankle, she ran straight for the door. Her hands were shaking violently as she unlatched it and threw it open, discovering the commander of the City Watch, Janos Slynt, outside along with another gold cloak. Both gripped the hilt of their swords as she approached. 

“In,” Janos Slynt spat. When his eyes traveled down to her breasts, she realized she was naked. 

Sansa shut the door forcefully and pressed her forehead against the newly installed oak, muttering a prayer under her breath. _The gods won’t hear me,_ she knew. _They didn’t listen to my father, and they won’t listen to me._

Littlefinger made no sound as he moved, for before she knew it, he was standing behind her, wrapping a blanket around her naked shoulders. 

“Don’t touch me!” Sansa cried out as she stumbled away from the lord, clutching the blanket to conceal herself. 

He feigned sympathy, but in his gray-green eyes there was naught but profound anger. “I understand, Sansa. Most women do not appreciate being touched after they are raped.”

Sansa took another step back on the ankle that burned. “ _Raped_?”

“I was present when Maester Pycelle examined you; he confirmed that your maidenhead is indeed broken and found evidence of your rapist's seed still inside.” 

The thought of Littlefinger sitting in her bedchamber, watching as she lay nude with her legs spread open to be examined by the old Grand Maester sickened her. “I wasn’t raped,” she said bitterly. “I wanted him.”

His forced smile fell, and the mask came off. “Did you mean to be his whore, or did you only mean to put his head on a spike?”

The words cut deeper than the dagger Ser Boros had placed on her throat. “Where is he?” 

“The dungeons, the same place they took your father before his beheading.”

“Behead--” Sansa lost her breath and fell back against the wall, one hand rising to cover her gaping mouth.

“He raped the king’s betrothed and killed his brothers of the Kingsguard when they tried to stop him. The Wall is not an option, my dear.”

_More lies, that’s all it ever is. Lies on top of lies, forever and ever._

“That’s not what happened,” she said in a breath. “If I can speak to Tyrion--”

“He has already admitted to raping you, Sansa,” Littlefinger interrupted with a vile, satisfied smirk on his face. “It was touching, to be sure-- watching a savage like Sandor Clegane take the blame, all to protect _you_ from going to the executioner’s block with him.”

The courteous little lady in Sansa was dead, killed sometime during the trauma she faced from Joffrey and his Kingsguard. Her northern blood, Stark blood, boiled. “ _You’re_ the savage.”

Littlefinger shook his head and sighed. “ _I’m_ the one who saved you.”

_You saved yourself, you saved your plan._

“How could this have happened?” Sansa muttered to herself, wiping away her tears before Littlefinger could find triumph in them. “Lord Varys--”

“ _Can_ be fooled,” he said proudly. “I _did_ leave, sweetling, but while my retinue continued ahead to throw off the spider’s little birds in the visiting towns, I remained nearby the capital. I knew it was inevitable that you would tell your Hound the threat.” From his pocket, he pulled out a single parchment. “I received a whisper, Sansa. Yet when I responded, I received no answer. It was not difficult to conclude that the spider took care of my friends. So I made new ones. An archer was a good choice.”

“You killed his horse,” Sansa exhaled incredulously as the memory of it returned to her.

When he took a step forward, she pressed her back further against the wall, igniting the aches and bruises inside. Sansa could not tell whether they had been from the Kingsguard’s beating or from falling off Stranger.

“I did no such thing,” he said tauntingly. “The archer shot the beast in the leg, not the heart or the head. However, I do suppose that spells out the same fate.” 

_This monster didn’t even give Stranger a quick death._ Sansa stared at him in utter disgust. “You’re cruel.”

“You may not understand my motives today, nor will you tomorrow or the next, but someday, you will. And on that day, you’ll thank me.”

“I’ll never thank you.”

“I promise you will, my dear. I chose not to inform Cersei of your plot with the spider to kill her son and flee in the process with his own sworn shield. It seems that no one will answer for that destruction; Lord Varys appears to be absent from King’s Landing. At the very least, now when I depart the city to return to my retinue, I no longer need worry about dogs and spiders corrupting you any further,” he chuckled scornfully. “A maiden you are no longer, but I am sure there is a lord who would be willing to look past that. Perhaps even a lord in this very room.”

_Lord Varys said that Littlefinger was to secure an alliance with Highgarden under the condition that Joffrey marries Margaery Tyrell. Once I am no longer betrothed to him, would the Lannisters force me to wed..._

“No,” she blurted. “I hate you.”

Somehow, that made him smile wider. “That’s a very unchivalrous thing to say to a suitor, Sansa.”

“As was threatening me, stopping me from being with the man I love.”

His smile fell. “ _Love_?” 

“Love,” Sansa confirmed tenaciously, her Stark blood rising. “I love him, and I’ll never love you. Not now, not ever.”

A silence lingered and just as the chamber darkened with the setting sun, so, too, did the ambience, bleak and grim. “Sleep on it, sweetling.” When Littlefinger turned the door handle, Sansa thought he meant to leave, but rather than step out, the lord only spoke. “Commander, if you would be so kind as to assist me.”

Sansa stepped away from the corner and backed up slowly towards the bed, her heart pounding, her ankle screaming, and her face flushing with apprehensiveness. “What is this?”

Janos Slynt walked in with a mean frown, the second gold cloak following close behind, and Littlefinger latched the door once the two men were inside. Before she could make a feeble attempt at running away, the commander seized her shoulders while the other gold cloak stood nearby awaiting orders. Ahead of her beside the table near the entrance, Sansa watched as Littlefinger stirred a spoon slowly inside a porcelain cup. “A necessary precaution, my dear. I will not have you end up like Lollys Stokeworth and carry a rapist’s bastard. You will drink this.”

 _Moon tea,_ she realized with horror. “I will not,” Sansa said resolutely. “You can’t make me.”

As he approached, Sansa fought against Janos Slynt’s grasp, dropping the blanket onto the ground so she could pull his hands off of her. Although she may have the blood of the wolf, she lacked the strength, and soon the resistance became futile. The commander held her arms behind her back aggressively and pushed her forward.

“Open your mouth, sweetling,” Littlefinger said softly.

“I won’t.”

The mask came off once more, and what appeared was a monster as terrible as Joffrey. “Drop the lady onto her knees.”

The stout man who reminded her much of Ser Boros Blount kicked the back of her knee, forcing her to fall onto the ground, and knelt behind her to continue to pull her arms back as far as they could go. “Do as you’re told,” he hissed at her. Sansa forced her mouth closed by drawing in her lips and biting down on them, turning her head away from the cup.

“Open her mouth,” Littlefinger commanded the second gold cloak. The gloved hand was like a steel clasp, the fingers pressing deep into the sides of her cheeks until her jaw was forced open. Littlefinger pinched her nose with one hand while the other poured the lukewarm contents inside her mouth until it was full. The gold cloak then placed his hand firmly over her lips to prevent her from spitting out the tea.

 _I’m suffocating,_ she thought as she held it in her mouth. _But I’d sooner die than let Littlefinger take away the only part of Sandor I may have left._

When she still had not swallowed after several seconds, Littlefinger knelt down in front of her and placed the hand that was not preventing air from entering her nose onto her bare thigh, tracing his fingers towards her sex. “Swallow or I’ll have the commander here go to the dungeons and burn your Hound alive.”

Sansa’s eyes widened in horror. _Burn…there could be no worse way to leave this world, especially not for Sandor._ Knowing the threat was not empty, Sansa pushed herself to swallow as tears streamed down her face. Once she had, the hands gripping her arms, face, and thigh released, allowing her to fall forward onto the ground. Sobbing with her face pressed against the floor, her strength was replaced with grief, mourning the child that may have grown had Sandor’s seed had the chance to quicken.

Littlefinger patted her head like a dog before standing up, and the three men exited her bedchamber with not another word or glance. Once Sansa heard the newly installed door shut, she forced her fingers down her throat and vomited the tea onto the floor. 

  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


“M’lady, His Grace has summoned you.”

Underneath her blanket atop her bed, Sansa was curled up on her side, her arms wrapped around her legs, ignoring the pains of her bruises in her core, yet ever aware of the grief inside her heart.

“No,” whispered Sansa to her maid.

“His Grace has sent a gold cloak to escort you, m’lady,” Shae persisted.

 _He has sent a gold cloak because four of his Kingsguard are dead, his fifth imprisoned inside the dungeons...before being..._ Sansa started to sob once more against her knees. _Why couldn’t Joffrey have died in that riot? Instead we did, Sandor and I._

The refuge of her blanket was slowly pulled away from her, unveiling her nude, bruised, beaten, poisoned body. Sansa squinted as her eyes adjusted to the candlelight beside her bed, observing the jet sky that was visible outside her window. “What is the hour?” she asked, her voice hoarse from crying, screaming, and shouting into her pillow.

“Late, m’lady,” Shae said, almost mischievously. 

Sansa looked over her shoulder at her pretty, raven-haired chambermaid. “What is happening? Why does Joffrey want to see me so late?” 

_He’s going to torture me,_ she thought. _He’s going to get every gold cloak in this city to beat me, or worse…_

“He’s requested a song, m’lady.”

Sansa sat up on the bed swiftly and grimaced at the pain. “A _song_?”

_Joffrey has never asked me to sing for him. Unless his version of a song is listening to my screams and cries._

Shae sauntered over towards the wardrobe, her hips swaying more freely than any maid Sansa had ever known, and pulled out one of her simpler gowns, dark green with a brown bodice that laced in the front. “Come, m’lady. I’ll brush your hair once you’re dressed.”

“Joffrey will not like that dress,” Sansa sighed forlornly. “It’s not _pretty_ enough.”

“But it _is_ comfortable.” Shae didn’t just say it wickledy, she smiled wickedly, too. “His Grace will not be pleased if you’re late, m’lady.”

_He will not be pleased no matter what. However, if I don’t go, he will come to my bedchamber with his gold cloaks and break down my door, he’ll have them beat me, and then..._

Sansa placed her sore ankle onto the floor and stepped slowly towards her chambermaid with her arms folded in front of her chest. Without another word spoken between them, Shae assisted in dressing Sansa in fresh smallclothes, the simple, dark green dress that she knew Joffrey would despise, and flat shoes without a heel that he would loathe worse. Afterwards, Shae brushed out her hair until the auburn waves cascaded softly down her back and though it would do no good, powdered Sansa’s face where she was bruised.

_Knowing Joffrey, he would rather see my bruises, not have me conceal them._

A whisper of a knock came at Sansa’s door, and shortly after, it opened. “His Grace is waiting,” said the gold cloak. His voice was deep and hollow, haunting, even.

Sansa wanted to scream at the man just as she had done for hours into her pillow, but instead, she stood quietly from her vanity and walked towards the door, clenching her teeth each time she stepped onto her sore ankle. She was relieved to discover that Janos Slynt no longer stood guard outside her bedchamber. _He is a horrible man,_ she thought. _It’s as if Ser Boros never truly died at all._

The gold cloak who escorted her did not seem unkind, although perhaps that was because he chose to remain quiet. As she walked beside him, there was something familiar about him, but Sansa could not think of a single City Watch man who she knew personally. When she glanced over at him to survey his features, he didn’t look like anything at all, only a man, common and plain.

Her deep contemplation ended when he made to escort her down the stairwell rather than up. Sansa paused on the stone steps. “His Grace’s bedchamber is--”

“Please follow, my lady,” the hollow voice said without breaking a stride. _Joffrey is going to execute me in the yard,_ she thought impulsively. _Perhaps it would be a mercy. Then I would never have to watch the man I love be…_ Sansa refused to finish the thought.

The gold cloak’s pace was much too quick for her strained ankle. Sansa whimpered quietly with every step inside the sleeping Red Keep. There were other gold cloaks posted about, but none did so much as glance at her once they say she was not without one of their own. In fact, many of the hired guards appeared to be asleep in the late hour. _Joffrey will cut their eyelids off if he catches them asleep on his way here._

Inside an emptied corridor within the keep meant for visiting guests of the crown, the gold cloak halted suddenly beside a door and in his pocket pulled out a key.

“In, my lady,” the haunting voice said. 

_Why would Joffrey bring me here? Is it so Tyrion will not be able to find me when he tortures me again?_

Sansa entered regardless, knowing that her options were limited to this one alone. The bedchamber was small compared to her own bedchamber, but modest. A small brazier was lit in the corner, and atop the bed, several bags. 

The gold cloak entered and locked the door behind him with the same key. Sansa felt her blood run cold. He strode past her and towards the wall, pushing on a single brick to open a hidden doorway beside the small brazier. 

Sansa’s eyes grew wide. _The secret passages of the Red Keep._

“I’ll return, Lady Sansa,” the man said, but his voice was no longer hollow nor deep, it was as familiar as he was, yet somehow impossible for her to place.

_Is Joffrey using the secret tunnels so no one learns he is coming in here to abuse me?_

When the gold cloak disappeared inside the wall, Sansa anxiously sat on the bed to rest her ankle and peeked into one of the bags, discovering that there were provisions to last someone for months. _Or two._ The disturbing realization hit her then.

_Littlefinger said he is departing the city. The gold cloak must be one of his new friends. And Littlefinger knows the secret passages, he told me once before. He’s taking me with him._

Sansa ran towards the entrance, turning the handle desperately before remembering that the gold cloak had locked it after they had entered. _I’m trapped._ Just before she could lift her hand to pound violently onto the oak in an effort to have someone, anyone hear her inside the sleeping Red Keep before Littlefinger could steal her through the tunnels, the hidden door made of stone opened once again. And the voice that followed stole her breath, healed her pain, and returned her strength all at once.

“Let’s hear that song, little bird.”


	8. Chapter 8

It felt like kissing a ghost. It felt like coming home. 

Sansa tasted only blood on his lips, yet it was even sweeter than the air outside of the city. His embrace felt weaker, yet it was somehow more comforting than any she had ever known. It was lost on her how any of it was possible, and the skepticism that this was real, that _he_ was real, pushed her away.

Sansa lifted her hand onto his face to brush against his scars, hoping the sensation would be authentic enough to convince her this was not a dream. In doing so, she observed the blood on his face, discovered how it collected on his neck, and gasped when she saw the spot on the collar of his tunic that was saturated with it. There was so much blood, Sansa wondered if he were truly alive at all. _Perhaps he is only a ghost._

“Sandor, you’re hurt.” Sansa felt like a lackwit stating the obvious, but their reunion left her lost for words.

“I’ve had worse, girl,” the Hound said unconvincingly, his voice rough and hoarse.

The longer she surveyed him, the more afflictions she saw. Sansa felt her Stark blood rise again. “What did they do to you?” 

He gave her a pained look and shook his head. “You’d be better off not knowing, little bird.”

Sansa’s vision blurred once the tears welled up in her eyes, considering the worst of scenarios in her head. Taking a step back, she observed him once more and saw that his clothes were ragged and filthy despite it only having been a half day since the riot. _He was wearing armor when we rode...unless..._ Sansa gasped. “They took off your armor and dragged you back to the Red Keep.”

Sandor took her hand and held it up to his scraped face as if he had not felt her touch in years. “That was nothing compared to…” He trailed off once he placed her hand onto his mouth, kissing every inch of her skin.

“Compared to what?” she asked anxiously.

“When we fell after that buggering archer…” he paused and breathed a ragged sigh. Sansa felt a single tear fall down her cheek as she watched the anguish develop on his face at the memory of his stallion being shot. She even thought he might cry, but all he did was take another deep breath and pull her closer. “I wrapped my arms around you before the impact to try and lessen the blow for you, but that did no bloody good. Your head fell back into my breastplate and knocked you unconscious once we hit the ground.” The Hound cupped his hand to the back of her head, and the tenderness awoke. She had felt it when Shae brushed her hair, but Sansa could not differentiate the pains due to the fall from the abuse at the hands of the former Kingsguard. “Stranger went lame, you were limp in my arms, and then those fuckers approached. Must have been twenty of them, all with steel minus that fucking archer. Once I saw Littlefinger with that smug, shitty grin on his face, I laid you onto the ground and took one last look at you,” his voice quivered just as he placed both palms on either side of her face. “Gods, I looked at how fucking beautiful you are and knew that would be the last time I’d ever see you. I’ve always been ready to die. I’ve never feared death. But when I looked at you and knew that _he_ meant to take you, I was scared out of my bloody mind. I knew that I had to kill him, so I ripped out my sword and cut through six of his men. I was paces away from hacking off his head before I was hit by that bastard, that fucking archer.” 

“ _Hit_?” Sansa returned her attention to the spot on his tunic that was soaked with blood and pulled the fabric down tenderly with one hand. The flesh on the right side of his collarbone was torn and untended to. “The arrow pierced through your armor,” she said in disbelief.

“Aye, girl, but even that didn’t mean spit to me. It wasn’t until they disarmed me did the real pain come.”

The distressed expression on his face terrified her, and for a fleeting moment she considered ceasing her curiosity. _No, I_ **_will_ ** _know,_ she thought. _I’ll know every single thing Littlefinger has done to harm Sandor, every single thing he has done to harm me. And someday, the debt will be repaid._ “What happened?”

The Hound inhaled slowly and pressed his bloody forehead against hers. “He touched you right in front of me, girl. That fucking bastard touched you and I couldn’t do a bloody thing about it. They took off my helm and my armor, tied me with buggering rope, and held me down onto the ground. Gods, I’ve never shouted or cursed so hard in my life.” His hands were trembling against her face, much like his breath. “I watched him lift up your dress…” A tear fell onto the ground, but this time it was not hers. 

_‘A rapist’s bastard’, Littlefinger said to me._ Sansa remembered the moon tea and grew nauseated. “Did he...rape me?” 

The question broke him, and Sandor Clegane cried. “No, but he would have, and he would have done it right in front of me had those gold cloaks not ridden out of the gate.”

His answer did not bring her relief, not when the memory of being forced to drink the moon tea flooded her mind. “Littlefinger was in my bedchamber when I woke up.”

Sandor’s tears broke off immediately, and his face flushed with rage, dropping his hands from her face to ball up into fists at his sides. “Did he touch you?”

“I woke up to him stroking my hair, and when I stood from the bed, I was naked. He said he was there when Maester Pycelle...examined me.” The thought of Littlefinger seeing her that way sparked her own fury, and each word she uttered was more difficult than the last. “He made me drink the tea, Sandor.”

He was fuming listening to her words, but became puzzled by the last part. “Tea? What tea?”

“The moon tea,” she cursed. “I didn’t want to drink it.”

“Little bird,” he sighed. “You deserve better than having my bastard.”

“I’d rather have your bastard than some lord, prince, or king’s legitimate child,” she confessed fervently. “And I thought I’d never see you again. I thought your child would be the only piece of you I’d have left. But he forced me.”

Sansa thought he might cry again from her touching admission, but shortly after, his anger returned tenfold. “ _Forced_? How did he force you?”

_He’s going to break this door down if I tell him. But, he’s like to break it down even quicker if I don’t._

“He ordered Janos Slynt to hold me down while another gold cloak forced my mouth open, and then he…”

“Go on, girl,” he rasped. 

The fresh memory pained her so much that Sansa shut her eyes when speaking about it. “He pinched my nose closed and poured the tea into my mouth. I tried to spit it out but the gold cloak held my mouth closed...I couldn’t breathe. I would have died rather than swallow it, but he told me he’d have Janos Slynt burn you alive.” By the time she was finished recounting the horrible moment, she was sobbing. And Sandor, he was hungry for blood.

“I’ll kill him for it. I'll kill him and the rest just like I killed the others. I fucking swear it on your old gods, new gods, whatever gods you want.” After his grief took the form of tears, it then took the form of lust. The Hound’s lips crashed down onto hers and the desperation of his kiss made another tear fall down her bruised cheek. 

Footsteps were audible coming from the corridor outside the bedchamber, reminding Sansa where in the Red Keep they were. Reluctantly, she pushed away from Sandor’s hungry embrace and whispered, “The gold cloak.”

The Hound almost laughed. “That was no gold cloak, little bird.”

Sansa apprehensively listened to the footsteps outside, sighing with relief once they passed right by the chamber. “Lord Varys,” she realized. “But he looked nothing like--”

“He used to be a mummer. A good one, it seems.”

Her attention shifted towards the forgotten bags that rested atop the bed. “Where is he? What are we supposed to do?” 

“The eunuch told me to wait with you in here before mentioning something about the stables. He’s likely meeting with those assassin children you care for so deeply.” When she smiled at that, he kissed her ravenously.

Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at the bed again and a wicked, impulsive thought crossed her mind. “The stables are a long way from here.”

“Aye, it could be awhile,” he said in between kisses, slowly pushing her over towards the bed.

Her growing desire made her forget his current physical state and mindlessly, she wrapped her arms around his neck. When he grunted painfully, Sansa pulled herself back and fell onto the bed. “Oh, forgive me. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

He stood at the edge of the bed and looked down at her as she sat, the right side of his mouth twitching just before he asked, “What did your maid tell you I wanted, girl? What did I say to you when I walked in?”

 _Shae was in on this, too,_ she remembered. _She had to know that the gold cloak was Varys. She knew I was coming here to see Sandor and not Joffrey, dressing me comfortably because she knew I would be leaving King’s Landing ahorse. And what she said that he wanted…_

“A song,” Sansa answered.

“The same one I heard you sing earlier.”

Sansa bit her lip when his hands worked on unlacing her bodice. “Someone might hear.”

“Half of those cunts on duty are asleep, and the other half are drunk after that bloody riot earlier.” Sandor forcefully tugged on her bodice, allowing her breasts to spill over the front. The sound that escaped him upon the sight was menacing.

Her eyes left his own and fell onto where the quarrel had pierced his armor. Sansa sighed. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

The throaty chuckle that followed sent her loins on fire. “They’d have to drag me from here to the bloody Wall before I’d be in too much pain to fuck you.” Despite his vocalized confidence, when he swiped the bags off the bed with his arm, Sansa watched him grimace. _He’ll never be able to put weight onto his arm, unless…_

“Lay down.”

The Hound gave her a side-smirk. “Ordering me around now, girl? _You_ lay down.” His large hand gently pushed on her shoulder, forcing her to fall onto her back.

Sansa huffed before sitting back up. “You heard me,” she said, unyielding. “Lay down.”

His smirk faded, but not from displeasure. _He likes me fighting back._

Wasting not another second nor a breath, Sandor eased himself onto the bed just beside her, wincing as he did it. Sansa knew what she wanted to do, what she heard other ladies her age whisper to one another, and that made her nervous and exhilarated all at once. Crawling beside him and resting on her knees atop the bed, Sansa ran her hand slowly from his thigh and over to the conspicuous bulge in his trousers. The groan that escaped him seemed to reverberate off the walls. Reaching for the nearest pillow, she placed it over the Hound’s face and shushed him.

When he ripped the pillow off, Sansa felt her arousal soaking her smallclothes. “I’m bloody sick of silence.”

“It won’t be for much longer,” she promised. Sansa took a deep breath, bracing herself for what she was about to attempt, desperately hoping that it would bring him pleasure. Before she could mull it over any longer and change her mind, she pulled out his erect cock from his trousers and leaned over to place it into her mouth. 

Sansa heard the pillow fall back onto his face, followed by a lingering moan. And then came several muffled curses. Sandor’s reaction built her confidence; allowing herself to listen to her instincts, Sansa licked up and down his length, savoring the sounds releasing into the feather pillow. The taste of him was so raw and singular that Sansa caught herself moaning just by licking around his girth, feeling the Hound become impossibly solid as she eagerly continued. She would have gladly continued to pleasure him with her mouth had he not grabbed her arm and pulled her away.

“Get on,” he breathed hoarsely. 

When Sansa made to remove her arms from the sleeves of her dress, he grabbed one wrist and said, “Leave that pretty dress on.”

The words made her fall in love with him all over again. _Joffrey would have hated this dress, he would have called it ugly, but Sandor fancies it._ She felt a fool for finding it so profound, but the thought made her abruptly shed a tear.

“What?” he asked quizzically. “You can take it off if you--”

“I love you.” Sansa wondered why she hadn’t told him that a hundred times since reuniting.

He groaned at the three words the same as he had when her mouth was pleasuring his cock. “I’ve never loved anything until you,” he growled, wincing in pain as he lifted her to straddle him. Sansa collected the skirt of her dress into her lap, and felt his arousal brush up against her sex over her smallclothes. Avoiding placing her hands onto his shoulders, she leaned down to kiss him. While their tongues made their own sort of love, the Hound reached down, spanked her ass, and slid her smallclothes to one side rather than take them off. Somehow, that made the moment all the more erotic. 

Sansa slowly removed her mouth from his own, biting her lip as she sat upright on top of him. With one hand, she grabbed the base of his cock and teased it against her entrance, her sex still tender from giving him her maidenhead earlier that day. It was a beautiful pain, one that blissfully reminded her that Sandor Clegane had taken her maidenhead and that no other man ever could. 

Time was of the essence, and she knew Lord Varys could return at any moment. Sansa swiftly placed the head of his cock into her sore walls and sat down onto it, moaning into the palm of one hand as she lowered down. The Hound’s hands fled to her breasts which spilled from her simple, yet fancied, dress, his fingers gently tugging on her stiff, pink nipples, making her sex clench around his girth with every tease. 

Being in control was better than she could have ever imagined. Sansa was able to set the pace, rocking her hips up and down his manhood in whatever manner brought her the most pleasure. The firm nub above her entrance rubbed against the coarse, dark hair surrounding his length, and that, in combination to his cock stirring inside of her again, sent her to a hasty climax. Sansa bit her lip to suppress the moan, but the Hound pulled her face down beside his ear that had been scorched away by flame and said, “Let me hear that song, little bird.”

Her peak intensified, and her newfound fearlessness of being caught pushed her to moan into his ear as his hips now did the work underneath her, thrusting himself into her so hard she couldn’t catch her breath. Her song of pleasure, her cries from their lovemaking, was all that was needed for her to feel the sensation of him spending himself inside of her again. Sandor groaned both from pleasure and pain as he climaxed, his body tensing up as his seed spilled inside of her walls. She never wanted to get off of him, and she might have slept just like that, with her on top of him while his seed quickened inside of her, had the stone door behind them not promptly opened. In a blur, Sandor sat up, placed himself back into his trousers, and lifted Sansa’s bodice to cover her breasts. 

The gold cloak returned. The spider. The eunuch. Lord Varys. Sansa still could not understand it. He looked younger, he had hair, he was thinner, yet when he spoke, it was undoubtedly Lord Varys’ voice and not the hollow voice of his mummer’s character. “Lady Sansa,” he greeted her.

“About bloody time,” Sandor complained in an effort to hide the fact the eunuch nearly caught them in the act.

The disguised eunuch smiled, staring at the bags that had been strewn across the floor and then at the messy sheets on the bed. “It appears you made good use of the time while I was away.”

The Hound cursed under his breath. “Are we leaving?”

“Yes,” the spider confirmed. “My little birds are where they need to be, a stallion much to the caliber of your former pet has been secured, and the passages beneath the Red Keep are secure.” Lord Varys took the sword from his mummer’s costume and tossed it into Sandor’s hands. “Lord Baelish and his newfound friends are at his largest establishment in the city. There will be lots of eyes…”

“Then I’d better be fast,” Sandor said. “You’ll get her through the gate?”

Sansa furrowed her brow as she laced up her bodice. _He means to kill Littlefinger tonight...and he means for me to leave without him._

Lord Varys nodded once. “Without difficulty.”

“You said that the first time,” he grumbled. 

“Wait,” Sansa interposed, “I’m not leaving without you.”

“You will,” he said severely. “I’ll not have you there. It’ll be bloody, girl.”

“I want him dead as much as you! But why can’t we leave King’s Landing now and find a way to kill him later when he’s not surrounded by so many men?”

The Hound glanced over at Lord Varys, appearing vexed. “Go on, tell her.”

The eunuch who looked nothing like the eunuch rubbed his hands together and sighed. “I serve the realm, Lady Sansa. And the realm only needs _you_ out of the hands of Lord Baelish, not your lover.”

“You plan on him dying there,” she said incredulously.

“I certainly hope not, my lady. Consider this a price he must pay; once he eliminates the threat of the lord who means to wed you in hopes of acquiring Winterfell should your brothers die, which he _will_ see to that happening, my little birds and I will extract your lover from the city.”

“Can’t your little birds just do it?” she asked him desperately. “I’ve seen how they kill.”

“It’ll be me who kills him,” the Hound said obstinately. “For what he’s done to you, I’ll not rest until I am the one who sees _his_ head on a spike.”

Sansa knew then there was no convincing him. Littlefinger began this battle inside a brothel when he forced her to watch the man she loved be intimate with a whore, and Sandor Clegane was determined to end it there as well. 

_But not without me. Never without me._

“No,” Sansa said, unwavering, “ _we’ll_ kill him. You and I-- together.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter coming soon (Aug 10-11). Sorry for the delay!


	9. Chapter 9

“Petyr.”

Littlefinger was leisurely resting atop a jade velvet couch inside one of the private chambers on the second floor of his establishment. He was reading a parchment when Sansa arrived, but at the sound of her voice, he sprang up and dropped the letter. And for the very first time, Sansa witnessed Petyr Baelish look entirely confused.

“Sansa,” he said curiously, even a bit fearfully, “how--”

“Forgive me,” she said, feigning remorse. “I did something terrible to get past the gold cloaks in the Red Keep.” Sansa shut the door behind her, but not once did she touch the metal latch. “I had to get out. I can’t stay here any longer...I want to leave...with you.”

The lord stood up and walked towards her, his gray-green eyes surveying her up and down, grinning wider with every step. “A sudden change of heart, my dear. It’s almost suspicious.” 

Sansa may have been a poor liar before, perhaps she still was, but her ability to sob on command was not done feebly. “I…”

Two slender hands lowered the hood of the cloak she wore and then grabbed her shoulders; Littlefinger’s grip was uncomfortable, mistrusting. “How did you leave, sweetling?” 

Sobbing into her hands, she mumbled, “I let them have me.”

“The gold cloaks?” he asked. Sansa nodded and felt his arms embrace her. “How many were there, Sansa?” 

“Five,” she lied.

“ _Five?”_ Littlefinger tsked condescendingly. “A maiden you were this morning, and now you’ve let one Hound and five sellswords defile you. What would your mother say?”

The mention of Sandor and her mother almost made her drop her mummer’s act. “I’ll never do it again-- I swear it.” Sansa sniffled into her palms.

Petyr Baelish gave a wry chuckle and said, “Perhaps not for them, my dear, but you will for another...in time.”

When she removed her face from her hands, she saw the mischief in his eyes and fought the urge to smack him across the face. “Forgive me,” she forced herself to plead. “I was a fool when I said I loved Sandor.”

“ _The Hound_ ,” Littlefinger corrected her, eyeing her suspiciously.

“The Hound,” Sansa repeated submissively. 

The smell of mint filled her nose when he kissed her. “You would not be the first to fall for a savage, my dear. However, you know I must ask: why the sudden disinterest in your little pet?”

Her hand burned, begging to slap his smug, cruel face. “He was sleeping with my chambermaid,” Sansa added to her resume of lies. “Once she heard that I...that he raped me...she confessed to me that she had often warmed his bed. You were right all along, Petyr. All he wanted was--”

“For you to be his whore?” he finished, grinning.

Sansa broke into tears again, but they were not false tears or tears of remorse. She was livid, and the tears were a product of her hatred for the lord in front of her. “May I come with you?”

“I’ve planned for you to travel with me all along, sweetling. After Joffrey’s...well I’ll spare you the details, but I _was_ going to come back for you. However, I do suppose there’s no taking you back to the Red Keep now. I’d wager those gold cloaks you gave yourself to are at Cersei’s door at this very moment, hoping to be rewarded with quite a bit of gold should they be the first to provide her word of her son’s betrothed running off.” Littlefinger paused to kiss her on the lips once more. “We’ll leave at once, my dear.”

“Thank you, my lord,” Sansa said just as the sound of glass shattering and a whore’s cry became audible coming from the first floor of the brothel.

He furrowed his brow and said, “ _Petyr_.” Sansa almost gasped when she realized her blunder, and before he could grow suspicious and pull the dagger loose from the sheathe he wore at his hip, she kissed him.

Petyr Baelish may have been clever, but Sansa knew that every man has a weakness. For her father, the late Eddard Stark, many said it had been his honor. And for Littlefinger, it was _her,_ the eldest daughter of the woman he loved since he was a boy. Sansa took advantage of the fact that he was infatuated with her before the mummer’s act was all for naught.

The hand that fell on the back of her neck could not have felt any less like Sandor Clegane’s. Sansa shut her eyes as tight as she could, dreading every second of the embrace. There was a second sound of glass breaking downstairs and then the sound of something heavy hitting the floor. When a man shouted, Littlefinger slowly broke away from the kiss and breathlessly said, “It sounds like my new friends are at odds with one another, sweetling.”

“Just a moment longer,” she begged. _A moment longer for Sandor to kill your men._

A muffled cry came next and then the sound of a man dying. All the while, Sansa stared into Littlefinger’s eyes, watching as the lust in them had left once he realized what was happening on the floor below. His eyes shifted towards the door once the sound of heavy footsteps approached, and before he could reach the latch, the Hound tore the door wide open and grabbed his throat in the same breath. 

The sound of Petyr Baelish choking from the Hound’s impossibly tight grip was somehow beautiful to her, as beautiful as the songs. Sansa stepped back against the nearest wall and watched as the life slowly fled from his gray-green eyes.

“Too clean of a death,” Sandor grumbled, loosening his grip on the lord’s throat just enough to keep him suffering a while longer. The Hound closed the door with his foot and latched it.

“Sansa,” Littlefinger strained to speak. 

“Don’t you ever say her bloody name again!” Sandor’s fist met Lord Baelish’s mouth, knocking out several of his teeth onto the floor.

A brash beating came at the latched door along with several men shouting to get in. _More of Littlefinger’s friends,_ she knew. _They’ll leave as soon as they believe he is dead, for when he dies, the gold dies with him. And then…_

“Sandor, we need to go,” said Sansa. “They’ll run to the Red Keep.”

The Hound, bleeding, sweating, and fueled by rage, had never looked more like a ruthless killer than he did in that very moment. _He is beautiful._ “How do you want him to die, girl?” he asked her sternly.

Sansa stared viciously at the whimpering lord, the man who had assaulted her time and time again, the man who could have been her father in another life who had touched her more times than she could remember. She then glanced over towards the flagon of wine sitting on the table. The Hound matched her gaze and chuckled cruelly when he understood. _There was once a time I may have chosen steel to end his life. But now..._

Remembering her own near-death experience from being forced to swallow the moon tea, Sansa said, “You said I would thank you, Lord Baelish. And now I will.”

Sansa nodded once to Sandor and eagerly watched as he reached over to the table, grabbing the flagon with one hand while the other remained clenched around Littlefinger’s throat. The Hound tossed the conniving lord onto the ground and poured the Arbor vintage into his mouth, placing one massive hand over his face afterwards. It was almost poetic to watch Petyr Baelish drown to death. He clawed at Sandor’s hand while struggling to kick him away, but the lord was powerless, unable to do anything to free himself of the one hand covering his face and the other that squeezed his throat. It may not have been a bloody death, but watching him suffocate brought her more comfort than if his head had been removed from his shoulders.

Littlefinger’s battle to fight off the Hound gradually slowed, and once his limbs had stilled entirely, Sansa released a deep sigh and listened. _Pure silence._

Sandor Clegane stood up slowly after the kill and grunted; Sansa had almost forgotten how injured he was from having been dragged towards the Red Keep and beaten inside the bleakness of the dungeons. “Killing him once wasn’t enough,” he muttered with as much rage as when he entered the room. Just like he had done to Ser Boros’ lifeless body outside the Great Sept, the Hound let his foot fall heavy onto the lord’s head, crushing in his skull with a sickening _crunch_. Yet once again, Sansa did not flinch away from the sight. 

He strode over to her afterwards in three long steps, leaving footprints of Petyr Baelish’s blood along the floor, and took her hands into his. “The others will die, too, little bird. I swear it.”

She did not realize until then that the shouting and banging against the door had ceased. _I did not notice because I was engrossed with the pleasing sight of Littlefinger’s death_. “They’ve left,” she breathed. 

“Aye, and when the dumb cunts leave the city to come looking for us, I’ll kill them.” Without another word, the Hound kissed her ferociously before leading her outside of the room, her eyes fixated on the remains of Petyr Baelish as they stepped over him. Sansa could hear the muffled sounds of whores crying in fear as they passed by the adjacent private chambers and departed down the stairs. Once on the first floor, Sansa witnessed the destruction Sandor had caused during his entry: broken flagons, chairs, and glass from the window lying all about the brothel. Also scattered about the floor were several of Littlefinger’s new friends, each of them dead with fatal wounds from the Hound’s steel. Sansa startled when she saw that one man was still alive, but her fear was soon eased once she realized that he was pinned to a wooden beam with two quarrels lodged deep into his abdomen, bleeding out slowly. _The archer,_ Sansa realized. _Sandor has killed him the same way the archer killed his horse--_ **_slowly_** _._ Sansa caught herself almost smiling. _His death might even be more poetic than Littlefinger’s._

The hour was late as they ran through the empty brick streets of King’s Landing. Sandor had tied the fresh courser Lord Varys had arranged for them to take inside a nearby alley in an effort to avoid Littlefinger’s friends killing the horse as they fled. Sansa winced at the soreness between her thighs from her and Sandor’s lovemaking as he helped her mount the horse, but that pain seemed to vanish once she felt him sit behind her. 

The horse’s gait quickly became a gallop, charging through the quiet streets of the city underneath the jet night sky. Upon the riot, Joffrey had commanded much of the City Watch to guard inside and around the Red Keep, allowing her and Sandor to remain unseen as they approached the Lion’s Gate once again. There were only two gold cloaks posted at the gate, and both were dead just as the others had been earlier that day, undoubtedly killed at the hands of Lord Varys’ little birds. 

In unison, the two lovers took a deep breath upon exiting the gates, both weary of what might await them outside. Sansa was thankful when she saw that Stranger was no longer out there suffering. _Perhaps Lord Varys had him moved,_ she thought. _Littlefinger would have kept the poor stallion injured and bleeding into the earth until his dying breath._

The air did not seem as sweet this time outside the city. Not without Stranger. Not without the Hound’s armor pressing against her back after it had been stripped away from him. But as the moon glowed in the sky above them while the horse pressed forward slowly, Sansa found solace in knowing that Petyr Baelish could never threaten, touch, or kiss her again. With Sandor Clegane, she would never have to tell a lie again nor remain silent. _Tonight, I’ll give him another song._

Sansa looked over her shoulder at the man she loved and kissed him just before he urged the horse into a gallop due north.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
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